


Dead Man Walking

by strikeyourcolors



Series: Files From Beyond [1]
Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types, DCU (Comics), Red Hood and the Outlaws (Comics), Teen Titans (Comics)
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Capes, Alternate Universe - X-Files Fusion, Best Friends, Crime Scenes, Demon Summoning, Demons, Gen, Humor, M/M, Minor Injuries, Paranormal Investigators, Past Violence, Unresolved Romantic Tension, alternate universe - fbi agents
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-05
Updated: 2018-11-30
Packaged: 2019-07-25 09:16:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 9
Words: 48,948
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16194587
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/strikeyourcolors/pseuds/strikeyourcolors
Summary: FBI Agents Tim Drake and Conner Kent have been sent to protect the son of Bruce Wayne from a threat on his life. Who, or what, is after Jason Wayne and his immortal soul and why is Tim so strangely drawn to him?





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> If you think you've seen this before it's because you have and the first chapter is a re-post after the edited copy was lost. 
> 
> This is a prequel to "I (Don't) Want to Believe" but was written after it. They can be read in either order, however, if you'd like to start here and continue or if, for more mystery, you want to read "I (Don't) Want to Believe" first. Now that another edited copy has been produced, the updates should stay on schedule. 
> 
> Credits to chibi_nightowl for the original mysteriously lost edits and the fic title.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you think you've seen this before it's because you have and the first chapter is a re-post after the edited copy was lost. 
> 
> This is a prequel to "I (Don't) Want to Believe" but was written after it. They can be read in either order, however, if you'd like to start here and continue or if, for more mystery, you want to read "I (Don't) Want to Believe" first. Now that another edited copy has been produced, the updates should stay on schedule. 
> 
> Credits to chibi_nightowl for the original mysteriously lost edits and the fic title.

“Thank you for taking the time to see me, Mr. Wayne,” Agent Tim Drake says with a polite smile as he accepts the cup of coffee the butler offers him. It's early on a Wednesday morning. Not so early that Bruce Wayne shouldn't already be at the office instead of entertaining government agents at home, he knows, so someone had to have tipped him off that he was on the way. He spares a moment to wonder who but, in the end, that's fine; Bruce staying on familiar ground for this talk is acceptable. 

“Of course,” He says with a smile that is open and honest and a little bit flirtatious. Anything someone wants to read into it, really. Tim also knows that Bruce Wayne received a diagnosis of anxiety at a relatively young age and he's touted as a success story for overcoming the social aspects of it. “I knew your father. I felt it was only right I find a moment to see you.” 

_Oh,_ Tim thinks. _He's playing the connection angle._ Which really shouldn't surprise him. It's not as dastardly an angle as the man could have gone for; he hasn't been threatened or bribed yet, after all. It's trying to appeal to him on an emotional level. Of course, a lot of people knew Jack Drake. Bruce gets points for having actually gone to the funeral two years ago and trying this tactic. “I appreciate it,” He answers and sips the coffee. It's not awful. Not the strong, semi-gel form of coffee he's come to rely upon, but it will do the job. “I'm sure you know why I'm here, Mr. Wayne. And I'm sure you know that I already know the answers to most of the questions I'm asking you. You knew my father, after all, but he also knew you. I came to parties in this house.” Years ago. He feels sometimes like he was another person back then. But in his line of work he's seen people who were actually other people years ago so it doesn't feel like a very fair comparison. 

Government agent. Department of the Unexplained. Technically off the books, though his director is petitioning every year for more legitimacy. He has the reassurance that if he ends up in any bizarre hostage situations in the line of work that the government will extract him. Beyond a better pay check, what more could he ask for?

“Then you also understand I'm protective of my boys,” Bruce says seriously. He's dropped the socialite act. Tim likes him better when he's genuine. He doesn't even think he is trying to be threatening now, but leaning forward with those broad shoulders and that bulk? He might be considered hulking for someone without the height and weight. Might be. Tim's been small all his life and trained extra hard because of it. 

“I don't mean any harm to your sons,” Tim assures him. He really, really doesn't. He's met Dick a few times and always liked him. Jason had been something of a boyhood crush though he admired him mostly from afar. Damian is...well Tim doesn't wish him well but that doesn't mean he wishes him ill, either. He assumes you have to get to know him to like him and he has no desire to perform the steps required to do that. “But you're a smart man, Mr. Wayne. You know if you don't talk to me they'll send someone else. And another person after that. Sometimes not the nicest people show up.” He really doesn't want that to happen to the Waynes.

Bruce has to know that. It doesn't stop his frown from deepening. “Ask your questions, Agent Drake.” 

Tim makes an effort to lean back, to look as harmless as possible. “It might be better if your son Jason was here. This is mostly about him, after all.” 

“No.” It's a flat refusal. No elaboration. That won't endear him to any other agent that might follow up after him, but Tim lets it slide. Mostly because he suspects Bruce feels Jason is in no shape for visitors. Bruce's posture reads tenseness. Protectiveness. 

Tim plows ahead anyway. “You adopted Jason twelve years ago? From the foster care system,” As though that's not a matter of public record.. “Was he orphaned?”

Bruce has no doubt been asked these questions a hundred times. “Twelve years,” he agrees. “He wasn't orphaned at the time. His mother had recently passed away and his father was incarcerated. His father died before being released which was when I was able to formally adopt him instead of foster him.”

"No other family?" But Tim knows this too. And he knows rich people have a way of making what they want to happen actually happen. 

Bruce seems like he can read his thoughts. "A paternal grandmother. Wanted nothing to do with her son or grandson. Two aunts and an uncle. Hadn't spoken to the parents in years. No one wanted him." He pauses. "Except me," he adds and Tim doesn't doubt that for a moment. Still, it isn't a social services interview. Sometimes there's a biological line running through these things. These extraordinary people. 

Jason Todd Wayne. Child of an addict and a petty, alcoholic criminal. Tried to pick the pocket of a billionaire and ended up adopted by him. It's a tabloid perfect story. Tim doesn't want to add anything else interesting to it. He doesn't want this to be what his bosses are looking for. 

Because Jason's adoption isn't all that interesting to them. It's what came after. "He was abducted at fifteen and, you were led to believe, murdered." Tim hates saying it. He had nightmares after the event itself and he relived them while he hunted through the file for any information. Prying into people's lives has a certain thrill for him. A certain excitement. Prying into a death, into a darkest moment, just makes him feel like shit. Especially when it's a kid. Even more so when it was a kid he once knew.

"Sixteen," Bruce replies. "He'd just had a birthday."

He's not volunteering any extra information. It's a good tactic. Tim wishes he were a little less decent because he wants to expose something in this case. It's clear there are more than a few raw nerves. "I've seen the photographs of the autopsy," he confides. He tries to sound casual about it, like he hadn't been sick, like he hadn't almost passed off the task to his partner before deciding Kon didn't need that burned into his mind either. He'd had to detach. Disassociate. The body on the slab had no relation to the boy who had waved at him once on the way to school."With the damage done by the murderer, it would have been difficult to obtain identification."

"And it was." It's as close to a snap as Tim thinks he'll get. Bruce has been coached, but this is still a wound that Tim is prodding at. "Teeth smashed beyond a dental record. Fingers amputated or the prints burned off. His face..." Bruce trails off. Tim doesn't think anyone can fake that brief, haunted look in his eyes. It had been gruesome for him staring at photographs; what was the in-person product like? What was it like when it was your son? The man had been the one to find the body while he tried to drop off a ransom. Tim's listened to his call to the police right after, too. The way he had barely managed to choke the words out. 

"I'm sorry," Tim replies. "I'm trying to get through my questions as quickly as possible." Because he is, without a doubt, making Bruce Wayne relive what is probably one of the worst days in his life. "But it wasn't Jason," he continues. "Because two years later you found Jason in a state-run hospital."

Bruce nods, but his expression doesn't change. There's no joy at the reminder of the day his lost son was returned to him. "He had been in a coma and he was only then recovering. It was pure luck that my oldest son was touring the facility and recognized him." But, this time he goes on. "It seems the kidnapper only injured Jason. Badly. Enough to cause him to forget, but he escaped. When that happened it would seem the killer abducted another boy and passed him off as my son." 

He's found in his line of work that victims, and the relatives of victims, often find a truth to believe. It might be a partial truth. It might be a complete fabrication. It's something that they cling to, never the less. It's something that keeps them functioning and Tim can't fault anyone for that survival mechanism however much he wants the entire, brutal truth. 

It seemed like it had been a miracle to find Jason Wayne alive. Tim's read at least forty of the articles that were written about this in the years that followed. "The body was gone when the police went to exhume it?" Tim phrases it like a question. 

Bruce frowns. "Unfortunately it appeared there had been some grave robbing soon after the burial. The groundskeeper covered it up instead of notifying the proper authorities. I'm unsure if it was your common vagrant hoping I'd buried my son with some jewelry or the kidnapper trying to conceal the fact he had killed a different boy.”

He knows he should let this go. He knows he should let Bruce Wayne believe whatever he needs to. The man is concealing a lot, certainly. "Were there blood tests, though? Hair follicle comparison? It appears that page of the autopsy report has been lost." Definitely purposefully. Money talks and if it can't talk then it buys a decent hacker to remove the offending material. "In murder cases, tissue samples are always retained. From the victim and from the attacker. Material under the fingernails for example-"

"What makes you think there were fingernails if there were no fingerprints?" Bruce asks, bitterly. "I saw the body, Agent Drake. Mutilated to the point a father wouldn't recognize if it was his own child. I'm certain the coroner did his job." He pauses. "Is that what this is about? An internal investigation that has made it all the way to the FBI?" He sounds skeptical. Also hopeful. A little obscene, really.

Bruce Wayne isn't stupid. Tim knows that from childhood and he knows it now. He's not someone to take nothing but a word on the death of his child. He's not a man of blind faith. He's also not a man who would have left the details and confirmation up to strangers. 

Tim owes him the truth. What passes for the truth since he's not sure Bruce could know what they might be dealing with. "There have been some concerns about Jason's safety, Mr. Wayne. We believe the killer who abducted Jason is active again. I'm here to investigate-" 

"That was years ago," Bruce cuts him off. “I assure you, my son has the best security available. Surely even the government can manage to investigate something like that when it happens instead of nearly seven years later?"

Tim studies him but there's no flicker of doubt on his face. No indication he might know about anything happening now that would draw the FBI to his doorstep. "Nine years," he amends for Bruce. "Jason died nine years ago. You only found him seven years ago." 

Bruce's expression hardens. 

"There are rumors about your son, Mr. Wayne," Tim attempts again. "Rumors that have caught the interest of certain people higher up. You should know how ruthless the government is. "About Jason seeing his potential killer. Remembering his face. Some say the killer is coming back for him. Others are arguing that he had to be in league with the killer to escape.” 

"Rumors," Bruce scoffs with a bitter, angry look. "There were rumors about you, too, Agent Drake. There always have been. Can you imagine if people put stock into every ugly rumor that circulates?"

This, of all things, is not a tactic Tim expected Bruce to take. He doesn't normally seem to go for personal insults. The Drakes, for all their money, had never had enough societal influence to protect themselves from rumors. One of the first and only fist fights Tim had gotten into was because a kid was repeating a story he'd heard from his mother about Janet Drake sleeping with the gardener.

It's not that rumor Bruce means, and Tim knows it. "I think there's a difference in rumors about my sexuality and rumors about him coming back from the dead. I just need to know if you think any of the rumors involving him might be true.

"Are the rumors about you?" Bruce counters viciously. 

But Tim only shrugs. "A little. I'm bisexual." He's crossing a personal line here and he knows it. His superiors had sent him in hoping for some personal connection to get them what they wanted but he doubts any of them anticipated things going quite this way. "Funny how the long-persisting rumors sometimes have a grain of truth." Bruce looks taken back by his candidness. Good. Tim set his coffee cup aside and began to gather his things. He tucks his notepad back into his messenger bag and withdraws a business card to leave on the desk, despite already having given him one. "Thank you for the interview." 

He knows Bruce wasn't talking about only the rumor of Tim Drake being gay. He was talking about Stephanie Brown. About Tim's long-ago fiancee and her disappearance, supposedly, so Tim could live out of the closet. Or something. Tim actually wasn't sure how the rumor had evolved, but he knew that he'd been invited to every Wayne function afterward as a kind of show of solidarity. 

Bruce stands with him and shakes his hand. All politeness now as he shows him to the door to his home office that probably puts most legitimate offices to shame. "I'll take what you said under advisement, Agent."

Tim nods, hovering in the doorway. No one is around outside to overheard him; he makes sure of that. “What do you think happened to your son, Mr. Wayne?" He questions softly as he steps out. 

Bruce's voice is soft behind him. "I don't know." 

~*~*~

Kon is waiting for him at the cemetery. It's not the one where Tim's parents are buried, thankfully, or he'd feel obligated to stop by and say hello. The camera strap around his partner's thick neck has tangled in the collar of his dress shirt. He'd really missed his calling as a photographer and hournalist instead of an FBI agent. Their shared love of the hobby had drawn them together in the Academy in the first place. It had only been natural that Director Lance had assigned them together afterward. At least, only natural when no one wanted to work with Tim and he got a reputation as an essential black cat of not only his department but everyone else's.

"Nothing much here anymore," Kon informs him without being asked. He's always good like that. A mind-reader in the non-psychic way. "Coffin was exhumed seven years ago, give or take. No body inside. Groundskeeper who failed to report a disturbed grave was fired. The guy here now says that it was a middle aged guy with a back problem. Not malicious, just lazy. He didn't think enough of the ground was disturbed for a whole coffin to be removed, so he covered it back up and decided the ground had sunk." 

"But the coffin wasn't removed prior to that," Tim muses as he looks at the staked-out patch of dirt and weeds. "Just the body." There's not much to examine here any longer. The Wayne family still owns the empty plot. Everything but the root of the gravestone has been removed (professionally, not by the weather) and Tim idly wonders if anyone is going to be buried here in the future. 

Kon nods, flipping through his own legal pad. "They had to fill in the area twice. Hole in the coffin that kept letting dirt in and making the ground cave in. They didn't know what they were dealing with since this is a nicer cemetery. Better coffins don't just collapse like that." He squints at the paper, even with his dark sunglasses protecting his eyes from the glare of the sun. "Theorized that a claw hammer was used. Slammed in and then pulled out, which was why the splinters were pulled toward the outside." 

That, too, is something they've seen photographs of. The only photographs that exist are grainy, clearly covertly taken during the brief exam of the coffin. It had been incinerated soon after. But poor quality as those shots were, Tim could believe someone had taken a claw hammer to it. "What'd you find out?" Kon asks him as they stroll along the graves. It's a pretty day. Tim's struck by how peaceful the graveyard is, and he remembers reading that the Victorians used cemeteries for recreation before public parks were easily accessible. He's a fountain of morbid knowledge like that. He'd like to think it came with his job trying to explain the unexplained, but he'd started collecting bizarre facts as a teenager.

"Not a lot," Tim admits, running fingers through his already mussed hair. He needs to get it cut. It's long enough that the fringe falls in his eyes. "Learned Bruce Wayne loves his son. He's not going to throw him to us to interrogate." It makes their job a hell of a lot harder but he's also relieved. He's glad that particular rumors about Bruce and his affection for Jason are not true. The man lost a child he loved. Nothing more, nothing less. "But I don't think even he believes the story about mistaken identities and miracles." 

"Who would?" Kon asks with a shrug. 

They head back to the town car, company issue, that he drove to Wayne Manor after dropping Kon off. "I'm starving,” Kon comments as they buckle in. Safety first. “Wanna pick something up before we go back to your monastery and flagellate ourselves?"

Tim's used to the debasement of the apartment he keeps in Gotham as well as how his obsession over the cases he's working could be thought of as unhealthy. He even as a wall, like a serial killer, where he can tack up all the clues and what binds them together. Cracking a conspiracy theory was what got him transferred to a department of his choosing (this one) but he's always had to be careful not to be too talented. 

The apartment was inherited; something his father had used for business contacts. Tim only has to pay the taxes on it and it's as good as anywhere to go for little getaways that he calls vacations and Kon calls aggressive self-punishment. 

Kon drives. Tim is lost in his obsession enough that it would probably be dangerous if he were behind the wheel. "A kid gets kidnapped. For what? " He questions. 

"Money," his partner answers, ever the practical side. Ever trying to keep Alice from jumping down rabbit holes. "Ransom money."

Tim nods. So far so good. Everything makes sense in this universe and in most others. "And the kidnapper beats the kid. Or at least induces some head trauma. But he gets free. Runs for it. So instead of cutting his losses, the kidnapper kidnaps another kid. One that looks enough like him to fool his father and the police and the coroner." He fishes an ink pen out of his pocket and chews the end of it. Kon watches warily; enough ink pens have exploded in his vicinity that he knows to be on guard. "He doesn't send any more photos or videos of this kid as proof of life or to lay a false trail though, he just kills him and leaves his body. Why?"

Kon steers the car into a little drive-thru. Tim makes a face; he's not a fan of fried chicken but by letting the other man drive he's given his consent to whatever culinary craving he has at the moment. If he orders a side of biscuits, he's probably stressed and missing home. "He wanted to kill someone. Or he wanted to fake the kid's death." 

Possibilities Tim's considered when they first began looking in to this case. "Because at that point there was no reason to kidnap another kid. Wayne would have brought the ransom money anyway. There was literally no reason to get a replacement at that point just for the money." He pauses while his partner orders, feeling the beginnings of a headache. Kon is apparently feeling likewise because he gets two sides of biscuits and a thing of gravy. 

Tim needs to talk to Jason directly. He needs to have information right from the horse's mouth. He's asked Bruce to have Jason call him. He's asked Jason's secretary to have him call him. He's going to have to resort to other means."The kidnapper brutally murders a boy and mutilates the body to hide the identification," Tim repeats. "Leaves him so Wayne only finds him after the ransom money is there. He doesn't get any of the money." 

They pull up to the first window and Tim absently hands Kon the company credit card. "Doesn't make sense," he agrees. "Can't be a simple ransom job. He wasn't desperate for the cash. He wanted someone to suffer." 

“Exactly.” Tim knows his face has lit up. He knows it by the wary look his partner gives him but he continues. "There are magical types that feed on pain and suffering. The way that kid died? It would be a feast for something like that. Making his dad suffer? Dessert." He's hedging on unapproved territory, here, and he knows it. Kon has seen a lot of weird things in his time with Tim. Tim's exposed him to a lake monster and psychics and low-key magical humans. Demons is pushing it. "It must ruin it to have things flipped. To have your victim come back to his family."

He falls silent as Kon is handed his food at the next window, accepting the large paper cups of soda without complaint and settling them in the cupholders. "What are you suggesting?" Kon asks, glancing over his shoulder. "We're just here to follow up, Tim. Make sure that the nine year anniversary isn't going to lead to Jason Wayne getting killed. By a serial killer or otherwise."

"Just," Tim snorts. The killer, if it can be called something so basic, is active again. Mutilated bodies. Children usually. Left where parents can find them. Lured away and killed, sometimes with a request for a ransom but other times no contact at all. “I think it's a demon.”

Kon, to his credit, does not drive off the road like that time he had suggested a werewolf was responsible for the disappearance of neighborhood pets. “Why would a demon want ransom money?” He asks, practically. Tim can always count on him for that. Cruel impartiality. He doesn't care if Tim is his partner and if they are so in sync with one another that they should probably be married; he's forever going to doubt. He's always going to call him on his bullshit. 

“Exactly the correct question,” Tim answers. “It doesn't. It's just learned our ways. It's trying to draw suspicion off its ultimate goal.” 

He reviews his notes on the way back to his place, reading Kon a little information on demons and on the victims, ignoring the way it feels like the chicken is burning through the packaging and into his lip. He's going to eat the chicken and hate himself, but he's starving and Kon's not going to leave him alone until he eats. They've been partners long enough he's aware of how this plays out. “I think this thing is going to come back for Jason Wayne,” Tim confides. “I think that it set the cosmic balance off to have Jason alive and well and his father content with that.”

Kon glances at him. “Why do you think that?”

“I don't know,” Tim admits. “Educated guess? I have a feeling.” 

Kon groans. He knows how feelings usually play out, too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Any questions/prompts/requests please see [here](http://strikeyourcolors.tumblr.com/ask). Reviews, comments, and kudos always loved and appreciated and of great assistance in keeping things on schedule.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In case you needed to know why Kon hates roombas.

The first lead, surprisingly, comes from Director Lance. She's an amazing boss, as far as Tim is concerned. She sometimes looks at him like he's lost his mind but she's more willing to believe. More so even than Kon. She scolds him here and there about his projects, but so far his statistics have earned him the right to free reign and independent investigation even if Kon more frequently ends up as his babysitter.

He has her on speaker phone as Kon chases his fried chicken meal with some ice cream while Tim yawns over a mug of coffee. “Oracle keeps seeing him,” Dinah says. “What happens to him changes, but it's clear Jason Wayne is a vital piece. The killer is coming back for him.” 

Tim remembers training with Oracle. He didn't have psychic gifts to remain in that department, but watching it had been fascinating. "But you don't have a clear view of the killer?” Kon asks skeptically. Maybe it's sarcasm; Tim's always found it difficult to differentiate. . “You can't tell us exactly how to catch him even with someone who sees the future?

Dinah sighs, probably having the same issue his partner does. It's an old battle convincing Kon that anyone can see beyond the scope of free will. “She told me nothing is specific. Very little she sees of the future is detailed because it can change so quickly and easily. Fluid." 

Kon frowns, but Tim had frowned pretty much the entire first month he'd been trying to understand it all. He's on board with believing, with researching, and the PSY department had been one of his favorite places to gather information. This covert, underfunded little wing of the FBI has psychics who can see the future, and yet they still can't save everyone. It's a disappointing realization to come to, and to wrap your mind around the notion of multiple futures and a lot of them ending just as poorly. They want to help, and Kon's good-hearted farmboy personality has charmed so many people, Tim included. They want problems solved. 

Well, as solved as they can be when they are often investigating the unexplained. They at least have a satisfactory resolution rate according to Dinah, and their department in general, even if some of the cases only feed Tim's insomnia with all the things that go horribly wrong in the world. 

This is probably why Kon is his partner. He's open and friendly where Tim is secretive and hostile. He has a reputation as being the brawn to his brain, but honestly Tim can hold his own in a fight and Kon can solve his own riddles without the other's input. Kon sees things one way, and Tim sees them another, and usually they can come up with a solution together. It's also why the man is his best friend, on top of everything else. At least, his best friend who is still in the country and not assumed to be dead.

“You need to get in touch with Jason and convince him to accept protection. His father has shot us down at every offering.” Dinah sounds exhausted, and frustrated. She's been working this longer than Tim has; he doesn't blame her. One encounter with Bruce Wayne and he already wants to shake him until he gets some answers. "I've met the kid. I don't remember much about him but he was friends with my stepson. A good friend, actually, when he needed one. He doesn't deserve to die gruesomely. Not that any of the other did but...him especially. Not after everything." 

Tim agrees with the sentiment but it's Kon who speaks. “We'll do what we can. We're having trouble getting into contact with Jason...” He cuts himself off with a grunt as Tim's pointy elbow is jammed into his side. The look the man gives him isn't pleased, but he was going to take care of it! They were going to be impressed with his ingenuity without anyone needing to step in and provide assistance.

“I don't have a current number. But my stepson might.” Her voice is hesitant. This case hits close to home for her. Closer, maybe, than it does for Tim, and he might be humbled by her belief in them. “His name is Roy Harper.” He doesn't bother to ask how three members of the same family all have different last names. Weirder things have happened and delving into the Director's personal affairs is asking for trouble. “He's still in contact with him, I think. I don't talk to Roy often but if he thought Jason was in danger, he would want to help. I have his address.” 

An address. No other contact. It's a distant memory, lodged in the recesses of Tim's mind, that Dinah's stepson had a drug problem and got thrown out of the house, even before she'd married his father. They haven't discussed it; some things should stay private. He assumes she sends him money and that she tries to take care of him. It seems a very Dinah thing to do; she basically attempts to parent anyone in her charge who will have it. 

“We'd be grateful,” Kon tells her, slapping at Tim's hands as he tries to pinch him for continuing the assistance request. He 's torn between being grateful and irritated. He'd wanted to be up all night linking phone records. He'd wanted the euphoria of a break through and the smugness of allowing his brain to work. Sometimes his partner has to remind him when a life is on the line. 

“I'll send it over.” Dinah pauses and sighs. “Be careful and stay civil. We don't need anyone making trouble for us.” 

Tim can agree to that much. He wants this to stay civil too. He's sure they bid their farewells but he's on autopilot, his face half in his coffee mug until he feels Kon's hand run through his hair. “You still with me?”

"Yeah, just tired," Tim replies belatedly, blinking a few times and realizing his eyes have dried out from where he's been staring too long, lost in his mind instead of in reality. It's what first made the department test him for psychic abilities, and put him under Oracle since she does the same thing. It's since been determined that Tim just thinks too hard and relies on too much caffeine.

They spend the evening quietly and amicably enough. Kon is...comfortable, for lack of a better word. Tim is pretty sure he loves him, and is just as sure he can never tell him because then Kon would want to quantify that love. He would want to put boundaries on and make him describe it. Tim's not sure he can do that. Especially not when it might come at the cost of losing someone who has become so dear to him. 

And so Tim pines from afar but enjoys Kon's company all the same. Tim delves into demonic research and his friend alternates between playing Tim's gaming system (not the latest or greatest, they're in Gotham after all, but good enough) and filling out the paperwork that keeps them both in material possessions like company cars and credit cards. 

"He's had names over the many years he's existed," Tim reads out of his notes. "The Fool, the Trickster, the Jester. Most recently he's being called the Joker." There aren't photos of him. He inhabits different bodies at different times, and leaving a physical manifestation of the evil lying around is simply asking for the demon to go unvanquished. He's not sure a demon can inhabit a photograph, but why risk it? Apparently other people have had the same thought. “Researchers have determined he lives by the law of sevens. The suffering he causes must last seven years or he will return again to antagonize his target.” 

Kon glances over. “Good thing it's been nine years then, right?”

“Since it happened,” Tim agrees. “But it's been almost seven since Jason was found alive. You have to assume that kind of thing breaks the curse of suffering.” 

Kon stretches out on the couch, looking at Tim half upside-down where he's sitting at the counter to the bar that doubles as his dining table. Or research desk. Or shelf to put miscellaneous objects. “I've read the file too.” Tim knows. He's caught him staring at the pictures contained within it with an odd kind of intensity in his blue eyes that is intriguing and sexy and a little unsettling. “He woke up from the coma but he had to go through some tough therapy to get better. And that's just from what information was available publicly. I feel like a lot of it was behind closed doors.” 

Tim is actually kind of proud of his partner. He's sharp. Sharper than some people want to believe of him, when he'd been a football star and he still looks like he tackles people for fun. Of course he knows the other man is smart, and gentle, and far kinder than Tim himself. He wishes Kon could show those traits to other people enough to make the lesson of them stick. “Jason certainly suffered for longer than that,” he agrees with a sigh. 

“Jason to you, huh?” he asks as he stands up. He refills Tim's coffee mug instead of cutting him off, a fact for which Tim is eternally grateful but also slightly suspicious. Kon usually tries to curb his habit, not encourage it. It's a fairly transparent attempt to keep him talking.

“I've met Mr. Wayne and Jason isn't it,” Tim replies. “And, I mean, I met him so long ago it probably doesn't count.” He's read the details so many times he feels a kind of calling. A kinship with Jason Wayne that he probably shouldn't feel. Tim's been chasing the other side for years and here's someone who touched it in a terrifying way. He doesn't need a fanboy.

Another ruffle of his hair is his answer. Kon likes doing that and even if he protests he doesn't really mind. “We going to Harper's in the morning?” He asks and Tim nods in affirmation. “How long do you think we have before the killer strikes?” 

Tim huffs, but it's fond. “You only ask me that because you know I have a brain for patterns. It's not because you believe me that this is actually a demon and my research has paid off.

“Maybe,” Kon agrees. “Does that change the answer you'll give me though?” His grin, boyish and charming and does strange things to Tim's heart, eases the challenge in his words as it always has. The man will always try to find logic to explain what happens when they are together. 

“I think the killer, demon or otherwise, will try for him sooner rather than later. The recent murders are proof the killer is active again after years of near silence. The victims are clustered in Gotham, too.” He hates it. For the victims. For Jason. For everyone. “That and if Oracle is already seeing him? It means things to lead him there have already been set in motion.” 

“Still don't believe in all that junk,” Kon replies and pours himself an energy drink from Tim's stash. In a cup. With ice. Like an animal. Tim makes a face and files away this moment for a later battle when Kon scolds him about his diet being primarily caffeine. 

But he pushes a file toward him anyway. He needs his eyes and his attention span. “You can look at the files on the most recent murders, then. Nice, cool logic.” 

“I was going to be a doctor before I met you,” Kon laments. 

Tim snorts. “You weren't. You were going into occupational therapy, you liar.” He stares at the screen of his laptop and a smile slowly spreads across his face as he reads his email. This is too perfect. Too bizarre. But it explains so much about Director Lance. 

“What?” Kon asks as he picks up the folder. “You have that slightly menacing, deranged look on your face that means you've found something.” 

It's a very near thing to avoid the no doubt insane cackling that threatens to spill out of his mouth. “Roy Harper is a clairvoyant.” Tim grins. He knows he's showing too much gum, so he reconsiders and tries to think logically. “Well, maybe not clairvoyant. He's psychic for sure but I'm not sure how his particular brand works.”

It all makes sense now. Director Lance and her department. The indulgences they have to explore these cases. It's all because her son is among things that shouldn't exist and somehow do. 

~*~*~  
Gotham is Tim's city despite the fact he left for college and never really came back. Too many memories. He'd been relieved last time to find his childhood home demolished to make way for a newer mansion on the land it once occupied. He'd never been in it again after the night his father had bled out on the living room floor in a summoning circle. Even passing it on a drive had made him nauseated. 

Too bad his memories can't be torn down like the house. 

Roy Harper's apartment is across town from Tim's in a largely working class neighborhood. The complex itself is clean and well-maintained. There's a playground in the center of it, though no kids are outside on the gray, fall morning. 

Tim ignores the looks Kon shoots him as they compare mailbox names to the address Director Lance gave them, and then trudge up three flights of stairs only to discover the elevator is at the end of the hall. The dark-haired man makes a face and groans at him at the sight of it but he's in good shape, so Tim doesn't know why he's complaining. He's only had a thermos of coffee, after all, and he's making an effort to be cheerful. 

He knocks on the door. No turning back now. At first, nothing happens. There's the drone of a television from the apartment next door, and a baby crying in the one across the hall. "It's early," Kon says. "Maybe he spent the night somewhere else and isn't back yet. Maybe he's not awake."

Tim lifts his hand to knock again and the door opens, revealing the man who has to be Roy Harper. He's thin, bordering on gaunt. His skin is the kind of pale that makes Tim look almost tan by comparison. It emphasizes the dark shadows under his eyes, and the way his lips are cracked. Still, he's dressed in jeans and a pullover which is not pajamas, so Tim automatically assigns him more capability points as being a useful human. "I'm Agent Drake and this is Agent Kent. We're with the-" 

"FBI," Roy supplies. "I'm sorry. I thought you would be here tomorrow morning. Or in the afternoon." He squints into the hallway like any natural daylight might be visible. "It wasn't supposed to be so overcast yet, according to the weather report."

"Uh," Kon begins before he coughs and straightens up. Tim's always amused watching the transformation he goes through when they are working a case and he needs to ask some questions. It's like he has to prepare himself for public speaking. "Did someone tell you we would be here?"

"Had a dream about it." Roy steps back and opens the door to allow them inside. "Knew you were on the way and that you're not out to do me any harm," he continues. He guides them through a tiny living room and into an even smaller kitchen. Or, more appropriately, a kitchen and a glorified hallway in which Roy has placed a card table. "That accurate?"

Tim is enthralled. Enchanted. Charmed. He knows he shouldn't be, but this is on his list of top ten introductions to someone. "What else do you know?" He can't resist it. He's too curious, even as Kon clears his throat and shoots him a look like they should be getting back to business. 

Roy yawns hugely. "You want some coffee?" He asks and Tim is contemplating how the redhead might accept a marriage proposal at the moment. He doesn't have a ring on him at the moment but he could find one. 

"Yes," Tim says.

"No," Kon answers with a tone that means his partner should clearly be refusing as well.

The subject of their attention doesn't seem at all perturbed. He even has a French Press and hot water ready to go. "I knew two FBI agents with dark hair would be at my door. I know you two aren't malicious, which is surprising given that you're government entities. You're also not investigating me, but what I can do is very interesting to you. Am I close?"

"You could have guessed the last one from the way my partner is basically drooling on your linoleum," Kon replies. 

"It's tile," Roy answers as he covers the coffee beans in water and puts the lid on the press. 

There is a sea of questions running through Tim's mind and he can't think of what to ask first. He knows other psychics. He's been trained by them. He works with them, closely on (painfully) rare occasions. But each one has their own particular brand of gift and their own line of sight and he admittedly very much wants to find out how far Roy's extends. "How long have you had your ability? How far into the future can you see? What focus do you have? Can you pinpoint exact events or-" Okay, forget a sea. This is a volcano. Tim is spewing out question-lava and not even a village in his path could stop him. He might not get another chance, even though he knows it's offfputting at the very least.

But the redhead just grins at him with slightly crooked teeth and a sparkle in his green eyes that makes Tim believe he's maybe not a psychic zombie. That's one point less in rarity, but still impressive. "All my life but I was a teenager before it got...uncomfortable." He puts more water on the stove to heat, glancing at Tim. "If I could pinpoint exact events do you think I'd still be running around freely and living in a relatively shitty apartment?"

He has a point. Oracle has often hinted to Tim that leaving the organization would be more than difficult for her, even if she has no desire to slip her bonds yet. He's relatively sure she'll ask for his help when the time does come and he knows already he'll do anything in his power to help her. 

Roy presses the plunger down on the coffee press at the three and a half minute mark and the smell of coffee nearly makes Tim moan. As it is, his fingers clench against the doorframe with a little more force from the pang of want that seizes his body. "But what exactly are you here for?" The man asks. "I trust you enough to let you in and I know that it's important I speak with you. This can't just be a social call.”

Kon takes the lead, because business is something he is far more comfortable with. "A friend gave us your name and said you might be able to help us get in contact with Jason Wayne."

Roy turns away, staring at the coffee, but not fast enough that Tim doesn't see his face. Instantly wary, instantly guarded. "What do you want with Jason Wayne?" He asks with a feigned nonchalance. He pours the coffee into a mug, the sleeve of his hoodie rising up just enough to give Tim a view of a few faint, silver lines on the back of his hand. 

"We have a reason to believe he may be in danger," His partner says, tone genuine and convincing at the same time. He pulls out a mini-notepad that Tim knows damn well he doesn't have any details written on. Still, he flips through the pages. "His father won't establish a line of connection for us and his name doesn't appear in any phone records. It's like he's a ghost as far as the government is concerned.” 

That gets a wry turn of the man's lips as he gives Tim the steaming mug of coffee. "Sugar is in the blue canister over there. Milk is in the fridge. I don't think I have any cream that hasn't gone bad." 

He accepts the cup, but doesn't move to doctor it to his liking. Business first. 

"We don't want to hurt him, either. But we're worried someone else might,” Kon continues when he realizes he's being ignored and he's so earnest that sometimes it hurts Tim just to listen.. Ultimately, he really did want to help people. He wanted to be in a line of work where compassion was important. This wasn't it no matter how hard he tries to inject some empathy into the situation. Tim's teased him before about working for a soulless entity like the government when he's still trying to perfect his aunt's apple pie recipe, but Kon's reasons are his own and Tim's under no illusions about how many people are lining up to be his partner. It's in the negatives digits. Kon is too good to him.

The redhead frowns heavily, setting up the French Press again to make another round of coffee. Tim approves of that much at least. If someone else drinks coffee (that is clearly excellent quality) it makes them much easier to trust. "Is he in danger now because of the time he died?" 

The phrasing is strange. It strikes Tim and burrows into his brain. "Yeah," Kon agrees. "It's about what happened then. We really do need to talk to him." He doesn't bring up Dinah's name. He doesn't ask for a favor or invoke personal ties; he's trying to appeal to the interviewee's good nature.

"Give me a second," Roy says as he puts coffee beans into the press then transfers steaming water from the stovetop into the container. He jabs a finger in the air at Tim. "I will be right back. Don't touch it." 

"It's like he knows you," his friend murmurs teasingly as Roy slips down the hallway. The door to another room, probably his bedroom if common layouts are anything to go by, shuts softly behind him. 

Tim scowls but is admittedly very tempted to mess with the press. He takes a sip of the coffee clutched in his hand and makes a sound. It's good. He needs to ask what brand that press is and where he gets his coffee and in what grind. There are so many little things that go into the perfect cup.

"Dude," Kon says with a sigh, not at all in official agent mode for the moment since they're alone which is another fact Tim appreciates about his partnership. "You're purring. It's almost obscene." 

"Mmm, good coffee," he retorts as he moves over to the canister where Roy had said the sugar was. He knows just how to fix it up to make it even better now that he's had a taste. "What do you think? Valid lead?"

"It's a little creepy." That's as close as Kon ever gets to an admission that he finds something strange and unexplained for the moment. "I guess the Director could have contacted him ahead of time. Or Mr. Wayne told him we were snooping around." 

Tim rolls his eyes, carefully pouring sugar into the cup in small increments from the measuring utensil he finds inside the canister because he doesn't want to bother to locate a spoon. There's a clean looking butter knife beside the sink so he sticks that in his coffee to stir it. 

"Harper's clearly in there calling Jason Wayne to see if he's allowed to provide the information," Kon continues. "But we're FBI agents. We'd be a little more subtle if we wanted to hurt him, right? It would have been easy for him to act like he expected to see us and Jason Wayne hasn't had much else noteworthy to be investigated for. These are really simple things for him to guess at.”

"You're like a supernatural grinch," the smaller man points out but it's hard to me too angry with a cup of coffee in his hand. "If you would just open your mind to the possibility that some things can't be explained-" 

"Then what?" Kon quirks a brow at him. "I can sleep safely tonight knowing that it wasn't just some sicko who is out there killing kids in horrible ways for their parents to find? That it's a demonic influence?"

Tim is about to answer when the door opens again and Roy steps into the hallway. He settles for glowering at Kon over his cup of coffee since this isn't an argument to get into in front of civilians. "This is really good. Thank you." Belated, but manners all the same. 

Roy shrugs as he starts to prepare another cup. The coffee beans have steeped long enough while he's been out of the kitchen and Tim kept his word not to touch it. "Your story checks out. Jaybird saw you at his house. Bruce told him it was something to do with investigating income taxes but he thought he heard his name. He wants to meet with you."

"Just like that?" Kon sounds surprised. A little suspicious, too, and that can't be blamed because usual clandestine meetings like the one proposed end in gunfire or trouble. Sometimes both. 

“His old man doesn't really let him talk about what happened then or what's happening now. I think he's relieved someone finally wants to.” Tim can understand that. He knows sometimes people you love have your best interests at heart but they still aren't doing what's best for you or for themselves. He remembers it all too well with his mother. His father erased any mention of her from their daily life and yet kept her bedroom in the exact condition she left it in. It hadn't been healthy for Tim as a kid to have to erase any shred of his mom, no matter how painful her death had been. Denial hadn't helped the wound heal.

“You mind if we take this conversation into the living room? My kitchen's kinda cramped.” Roy asks as he finishes preparing his coffee.

Of course, Kon instantly looks around the kitchen for anything Roy is trying to hide because he's suspicious that way. Close quarters don't register with him; he finds everything _cozy_ in a way that Tim has found maddening. He's been trying to move him away from driving the smallest compact car he swears ever invented (it's a Versa, it's not actually the tiniest around but boy does it feel that way, especially since his partner is built like a linebacker) and into something larger. Maybe something Tim can haul his stuff in, because it will be a cold day in Hell before he gives up his own vehicle. 

But Tim simply nods and nudges Kon back in clear decision that they should vacate to another room. He has to bump into him to get past him; it's not just a subtle hint he should stop alienating their current link to Jason. They trudge back into the living area and Tim takes a seat while Kon paces as subtly as he can manage.. 

He almost manages it, too. At least until the sounds of a robotic monkey erupt from the floor at Kon's feet. His eyes widen slightly and he leaps back but Tim is impressed that his partner refrained from doing worse; he would have shrieked. He leans over and picks up the stuffed toy, staring at it. 

“My daughter's,” Roy explains. We're still trying to learn about picking up our toys but she doesn't grasp the concept yet.” 

Kon takes another step and grimaces. Tim glances down to see granules of what he thinks are goldfish crackers wedged into the carpet. 

“She also doesn't grasp not smashing her food into the rug.” Their host reaches over to turn on the little vacuum cleaner nearby. 

“Oh my God,” Tim breathes. Kon shoots him a sharp look. “Is that a roomba?” He _loves_ roombas. He's been not so subtly hinting that it's exactly what he wants for Christmas. So far his best friend has refused him like he's a child asking for a puppy. He also reminds Tim he could easily obtain one himself, but probably shouldn't if he ever wants him to visit again. He has an unreasonable grudge against them. 

He hears the sound of Kon's palm contacting his forehead but Roy humors him. “We call it Bedelia, though God knows what was going through her mind when she named it.” 

“Amelia Bedelia,” Tim supplies. The two men both stare at him. “The maid who does stupid things? Puts dust on the furniture? It's a book for kids?” And Roy had said he had a daughter. Apparently she doesn't have the refined literary tastes Tim has as a child.

The redhead grins and sits down with his coffee, drawing his legs up as Bedelia hunts around the room for more goldfish crackers to attack. “Not a book she has at my place, so I'll take your word for it. I'm kind of relieved to know her naming abilities make a little more sense now. I'm never sure when she's not just throwing random sounds together.” 

Kon is still standing, looking over the collection on a bookshelf. Tim takes another sip of the heavenly coffee. “Did you just want to give us the number?” He asks when the silence stretches on a little too long. Their subject doesn't seem put off by them, or in a hurry to push them out the door but he's quiet. 

“You have questions,” Roy replies. “I guess I was just waiting for you to ask them out loud so I didn't freak you out or anything.” He licks his lips. “I was maybe sixteen when I started dreaming things that happened with any real clarity. Somehow my power focused in on death soon after. Walking down the street I'd suddenly know the old lady in the corner store was going to have a stroke, or that the little boy playing with a ball was going to chase it into the street and get hit by a car.” He shakes his head and sighs a little. “Drove me completely batty. I didn't know how I was seeing these things. But they were intense. Unable to be controlled.” 

It's like a research article come to life. Psychics with specific, tangible abilities are difficult to find. “That must have been difficult.” Tim's not even simply saying things to ease Roy. It's not a falsity to make him seem like he sympathizes. It's still unfair he had to go to sensitivity training not once but twice. It's not that he doesn't _care_ it's that he doesn't know how to _express_ it. 

Also maybe that he's far more interested in chasing things than he is people. At least that's what Kon tells him. He doesn't even bring up the fact that he hasn't asked Roy this question out loud, even if it has been running through is mind. 

“It was. I'm not proud of that time in my life. But I've been sober for years now. I have a daughter. Have a place here though I'm looking to move back to Star City.” He grins and there's a hint, Tim thinks, of someone he used to be. Someone he might have been without his ability weighing him down. Tim wonders what it would be like to have psychic visions and have to analyze each one for a clue. Would it make him far more efficient or cripple him? But ultimately, he knows it's a burden. “I know you've touched the other side. Like me. Like Jay. But you weren't even aware of it, were you?”

Tim's eye widen slightly. That's certainly not what he was expecting and the phrasing of it is charming and almost mystical. He loves it. “Which particular incident?” He's been close? Enough that it's left some kind of spiritual mark on him? He's harbored suspicions, of course, but he's never thought he's crossed over that far. Brushed against, perhaps. “Was it-” 

He's interrupted by a terrible grinding noise and alarming beep. Kon is desperately trying to pull his leg up. “It's got my shoe lace!” And, surely enough, the little roomba is sucking up his shoelace with a noise that sounds like a growl. 

“Bedelia!” Roy puts his coffee down and hustles over like the robot is a dog. He presses a few buttons on the top, gently prying Kon's shoelace out of the interior of the machine.

“Why are you even wearing sneakers?” Tim questions first, then gets to the more important one. “Is Bedelia alright?”

“Are you seriously siding with a cleaning appliance over me?” Kon pulls his foot free, scooting away from Roy to tie his shoe lace. For some reason he'd chosen sneakers with his khakis this morning instead of his regular dress shoes. 

“Yes because Bedelia was just doing what it was made to do and you lecture me about dress code all the time,” Tim replies haughtily, but he's eyeing Roy's abandoned coffee and wondering how mad he'd be if he stole it because he also sees advantages in chaos.

The man glances up. “Don't try it. And Bedlia is fine.” The roomba escapes its owner's hold, heading to suck up the cracker crumbs in the carpet in front of the television while Roy sits back down. Kon edges over to sit in a chair opposite Tim. 

“How long have you known Jason Wayne?” He asks, apparently trying to save face since being attacked by a cleaning appliance. He fishes a pen out of his pocket to actually put his little notepad to use. It's kind of cute. Tim stares at him a little too long when he does things like this. 

“Ages,” Roy tells them languidly, dragging out the word. “I went to school with his older brother but kinda lost touch for obvious reasons.” He scratches at the back of his hand. Tim wonders if it's self-consciously or if it genuinely itches. “I didn't know Jay before the incident.” He pauses. “Is that what Bruce is calling it these days? I got kicked out of his house once for calling it a murder.” 

Tim can believe that with how protective Bruce seems. “You met him after?” His partner asks to confirm. “Through his brother?”

“Kind of. We were seeing the same therapist at the time and his brother was dating her. It's a little confusing but Kori was great for both of us. We were great for each other too. Just fucked up enough to not be all judgmental but still functional enough to offer insight.” He takes a long drink of his coffee. “I like to think we've improved by leaps and bounds since then.”

Jason Wayne's medical history has been strangely wiped clean, other than visits to a general practitioner and physical therapy for coma recovery. Tim knows he must have had some kind of therapy, or seen a psychologist, but he hasn't found evidence of it. He knows Kon has made a note of the name Roy's dropped so they'll at least have that to go on if they want to investigate further. It feels a little too personal to demand records from a therapist; it might be a lst resort. He watches idly as Bedelia finishes with the crumbs and sets a path on the rug itself. The path ends with it bumping against the toe of Kon's shoe. Kon glares and lifts his foot. 

“I can put it up,” Roy offers. 

Tim shakes his head in refusal. He knows his partner is too proud to ask and this is some pretty valuable entertainment that he's not about to miss out on. “Is there anything suspicious you've noticed lately?” He questions, taking over for his partner who is trying very hard not to curl up in the chair to escape the vacuum. “Strange behavior from anyone? Suspicious figures lurking around?” No, that would be too much to hope for. It's never that simple.

Roy's gaze is sharp. Too sharp. “Jason's been jumpy lately but he gets like that sometimes.” His words are careful, however. He's just as protective of Jason as Bruce is, albeit in a different way, and it's more than likely very difficult to trip up a psychic. “You told me his life was in danger and it all just clicked in my head. That's the feeling I have. That's the dream I've had. Jason running from something and getting caught. But not all of my visions are so literal.” He frowns, staring at the chipped rim of his mug before glancing back at Tim. “What's after him?”

“You say 'what' and not 'who',” Kon points out as tactfully as possible when the roomba decides to go under the couch to look for dust bunnies to eat and he can once again make eye contact with the man they are interviewing.

“I guess we all want to believe no human could do horrible things,” Roy replies easily. It's amazing how casually he can switch language, depending on if he's talking to a believer or a nonbeliever. It's one hell of a protective mechanism.

Tim knows about demons in sheep's clothing, too. He doesn't want to give away too much, just in case. He seriously doubts Director Lance would send him to a demon or that this elaborate ruse would have gone on for so long, but he also doesn't want to expose Roy to information that other beings would terrorize him to get. “The coffee was amazing, by the way. But we should probably get going if you can just get us his contact information.” 

“Unless you can think of anything else that might help us,” Kon adds, then the mechanical whirring is back. The roomba has crept up on him from behind and is attempting to ingest his pant leg. “Why is it only doing this to me?!?” He demands. 

“It knows you hate it,” Tim retorts. He leans down, fluffing out his own suit pant legs for the thing. “It senses it. Come here, Bedelia.” 

Kon grunts in disgust. “It doesn't have ears or any ability to feel human emotion, you realize.” He tentatively reaches down, trying to pry it loose before he yelps. “Ow! It bit me!”

“It doesn't have teeth,” Tim mocks, but he crawls over to try to rescue his friend. This is nothing compared to him being trapped in the mouth of a gator man or kidnapped by what Tim swears were trolls. “Come on, Bedelia. Let's go back to your charging station.” 

Roy is laughing as he wrestles one determined little robot back into its dock to keep it away from the FBI agent. He stands up to snag the notebook and pen from Kon, scribbling down a phone number. “This isn't my number, by the way. Burn it after you use it, would you?”

Bedelia safely put away, Tim rises to shake Roy's hand. Kon does likewise, but he keeps a cautious eye on the roomba. “Thanks for the help,” he tells him. “I'd love to set up a session some time when I'm not working a case. If you're willing-”

“I'm not,” Roy says to cut him off. “No offense. I don't do sessions. I don't do readings. I don't try to see anything in particular. It opens all kinds of heebie jeebie shit in my head and it's just...it's not good for me.” 

“Of course,” Tim says. He can imagine Roy wouldn't want to risk it with so many bad things looming on the horizon but he can always hope he'll change his mind. He's stressed right now. “I'll leave you with our cards. Don't hesitate to call if you think of anything. Email works, too.” 

Numbers exchanged, Roy sees them out of his apartment. “Tell Dinah that I'll call her sometime soon, alright?”

Tim blinks at him. Kon shakes his head. “You gather that from us being FBI?”

Roy smirks. “That's something you and I both wish was true.” He leans forward as Tim sets out down the hall, murmuring something to Kon. Tim shoves down his insatiable curiosity and ignores it; he might not be psychic but he knows when something is private. 

 

The cloud cover over Gotham has broken only slightly by the time they step outside, leaving weak morning light filtering through. They walk in silence back to the parking garage as Tim tries to keep his spinning thoughts grounded. Jason Wayne's safety comes first. Roy Harper's psychic abilities are to investigate later. 

“I can't believe you're afraid of a roomba,” he says when they're back in the car. He can't resist poking the bear a little bit while his mind chews on the the facts of the interview and in this case, the bear is Kon. 

“That thing was totally out for blood!” His partner argues fiercely. “It was like a murder roomba!” 

Tim gigglesnorts. He doesn't mean to. He never means to. He hates the noise that suddenly makes him feel like he's awkward and in highschool again. “You don't believe there might be lifeforms on other planets that visit this one but you believe a vacuum cleaner is capable of pre-meditated murder without human influence?”

Kon glares. It's more a pout, but sometimes Tim lets him have his dignity and pretends to be intimidated. “You saw it. It was only after me.” 

Only after him and the remains of a toddler's snack foods. “Maybe it sensed your fear,” Tim says sweetly. 

“You joke, but I maintain those things are oddly sentient and if you ever bring one into my office then I will shoot it.”

“Spoil-sport.”

“I bet if you were a robot you'd be a murder roomba,” Kon mutters.

Tim can't even disagree with that assessment. It sounds exciting to be a murder-robot of any type. “I'd make sure I first lulled you into a false sense of security and then murdered you. I wouldn't go after your shoelaces and pants. Right for the jugular.” 

Kon shudders. “Where are we going?” He questions as he loads the GPS on the car. The thing is hopelessly outdated but somehow Tim's solution of using either of their phones to navigate hasn't appealed to Kon. Nor has letting Tim drive. He's contented with their ratio of getting lost being low instead of non-existent. 

“Hungry?” Tim asks brightly because now that he's had another cup of coffee, his stomach has decided to make him aware he hasn't had breakfast. “I know a place. Best waffles in Gotham, or so said a girl I know. Used to know.”

“Is she going to meet us?” Kon questions. He pulls out of their parking place carefully, religiously checking all the mirrors. Sometimes Tim likes his partner's paranoia. Okay, most of the time. It bleeds into his own obsessive habits so well and he can always depend on the little things he misses to be picked up.

“She's in Africa.” He's surprised at how easily he says it. It's almost startling how this closely guarded secret can spill from his lips so casually. “Stephanie.” He's talked about her. A friend from higschool. A friend in Gotham. He writes letters to her. They talk on the phone. Tim's amazed by how wonderful it is to have her back in his life and saddened she's not there in person. It's just a few more months until they can manage that much. 

“This isn't going to be like a girlfriend who lives in Canada thing, is it?” Kon questions. “Like if you paid someone to write you letters and call you and pretend to know you then one night I meet you for dinner and you're sitting there with a sock dressed up as your girlfriend?”

Tim grins. “Give me some credit. I'd at least have a mannequin.” 

“Creepy, dude. Creepy.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Questions/Comments/Prompts and requests can go [here](http://strikeyourcolors.tumblr.com/ask). Reviews, comments, kudos, and wild speculation appreciated <3


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is long. Really long. I feel like I should apologize but I can't find decent places to cut it off so my indecision is your reading misery. At least Jason finally shows up?
> 
> Fun fact: There are at least five versions of this fic circulating in various states of being edited. All contain roombas.

The waitress remembers Tim. He started coming here when he was sixteen, with Steph, and it's a miracle he didn't weigh nine hundred pounds by the end of highschool because he ate to calm his nerves around girls (and Steph was most definitely one of those) and he ate to drown his sorrows over his mother, or his father, or any of the other numerous terrible things that happened. Florence had served him without complaint or judgment and was always there with a sympathetic ear, advice on the day's specials, and another plate that she 'accidentally' made extra. 

This was also the place he discovered coffee, and he'd begun stopping at a healthy serving of waffles in order to save room for even more cups of coffee. 

The drink is bitter here. It sits too long and on too high of a temperature. Tim drinks it anyway for the nostalgia factor and endures Florence as she ruffles his hair and tells him he should stop by more often before she trots off to take care of another table. 

"I don't think she realizes I moved away," Tim replies to Kon's quizzical look. "Or that I aged. She seems to think I'm permanently stuck at sixteen." He doesn't mind. She doesn't do it in a patronizing way and he realistically has very few people who will coddle him like this. "Oooh," he says, staring at the menu. "The birthday cake waffle is new. Personally I like the raspberries and lemons but I hear good things about the orange banana and s'mores waffles."

Kon scans the menu and turns it over in his hand, frowning at the blank back page of it. "Do they have anything that isn't so...wafflely?"

"I'm sorry," Tim comments dryly. "Was the name Waffle Shack somehow misleading? The smaller sign that read 'waffles, waffles, waffles'?" He knows the look on his partner's face. That look that clearly says he totally likes waffles but he likes them the way he has them in Kansas and he's afraid to try some big city waffles and like them more. "Get something crazy," he suggests, trying to navigate this situation without picking a fight. He's learned a lot in the year of being his partner. "What about the Nutella waffle? Or the blueberry pie?"

Kon frowns harder. Tim makes a mental note to stay away from anything pie related. "Siracha chicken waffle," he suggests. That seems pretty far from anything he would have at home. 

In the end it's what Kon orders. Tim asks to be surprised which his partner thinks is risky but they know his tastes here and he's met very few waffles he doesn't like. "That was an oddly productive meeting," the larger man comments as he examines his orange juice, no doubt trying to see if it's fresh-squeezed. "Usually we just get a lot of suspicious anger and a run around." 

Tim shrugs, but he is feeling pretty pleased. It's not often they make progress like this so quickly. This case basically just got dropped on them with a very limited time frame and he's glad they haven't stalled. "He knew we were there to help Jason."

"He asked him for permission to give us his information," Kon reminds him. 

Another shrug is his reply. "I'd do the same for you. But I also wouldn't even risk calling unless I thought someone was genuinely trying to help." They've been in a couple of situations like that already. People had soon learned they couldn't play one partner against the other. Kon felt protective of Tim and Tim simply liked Kon's company too much to think of betraying him. His had never ostracized him, and he never scolded him for being too weird. Struck by the sudden burst of affection, he nudges their legs together under the table.

His partner just shakes his head, but he smiles. It's hidden quickly behind a ducking of his head and lifting of his shoulders and he seemingly focusing on his notes, but Tim still knows. 

"I always thought abilities like that would be interesting to have," Tim confides, though it should come as a surprise to no one that he fantasizes about being even weirder in this world. "But like that? Having feelings and seeing visions you might not ever be able to make sense of? It sounds incredibly frustrating." He's not sure how Oracle has done it or how she takes so many threads of future and tries to find the common ones, to take a guess at what is going to happen and what they need to do. 

She's seen that Jason Todd is in danger. She's seen that his death would have a lasting impact. Roy Harper, likewise, knows something is amiss. However annoyed Tim and Kon are they they can't get more information, no doubt it's even worse for the ones with the visions. 

"I can't imagine how your apartment would look then," Kon agrees. "The real one. Not the weird one you keep here." And Tim wants to huff and argue that the apartment in Gotham is just as tangible as the one in D.C. but he knows exactly what Kon means. "You already explode when you're working on a case. Sensitive documents everywhere. Televisions playing witness interviews on repeat. Then you can't even have a maid come in because of the information you've unleashed so you basically live in piles of laundry." 

"I at least _wash_ it," Tim argues defensively. "I just don't...put it away." 

"You're a nesting creature. Or a burrowing one. It's cute." Kon grins and their eyes meet, just for a moment, Tim thinks there's something. Some spark of connection that goes deeper than friends or partners.

Then the waffles arrive. Tim ends up with mint mocha chip, and Florence shakes a can of whipped cream before drawing a smiley face on the top of the waffles. "Eat up," She says and ruffles his hair. "You're a growing boy." 

She walks away, pleased, and Kon is grinning at him again. "I used to believe her, too," Tim replies glumly. "I think at twenty I finally accepted that I was not going to hit some late in life growth spurt. I briefly looked into surgery but-"

"They have surgery to make you taller?" Kon cuts in. 

"They break your legs and re-set them. It's pretty painful and you only get maybe another inch or two." He sighs before he crams his mouth so full of waffle that his cheeks hurt. "Not worth it."

"Chew with your mouth closed," Kon scolds and Tim tries not to laugh because then he'll choke. He does have good table manners, usually. Sometimes getting a rise out of the other is simply too fun to resist. Teasing him too about the crazier things he's researched, or thought of, have proven to be vastly entertaining for Tim. 

Of course, Kon always gets back at him with stories about life on the farm. Tim isn't sure he'll ever look at chain the same way knowing you can tie it around a calf's hoof and pull it out of its mother. He's also not sure he ever really wants to shake hands with Kon again. 

Tim sticks his tongue out, which causes a little bit of whipped cream to dribble out of his mouth. He has to look away to not burst out laughing at Kon's disgusted look and the way his hands inch forward, like he's going to wipe off the little drip with his napkin. 

Kon is laughing. Laughing so hard he has tears in his eyes. Tim spits out something he chooses to believe is not a bubble of spit and whipped cream. "I'm glad my suffering amuses you," he mutters as he eats his waffles. 

It takes a while for Kon to recover. As it is, he tries to eat his meal with only occasional pauses to start snickering at Tim when he actually looks at him. Tim doesn't dignify the giggling even with an expression. The mocha chip waffles are _delicious_. The coffee is still horrible but it reminds him of other times. Not better. Just other. He can almost imagine he's studying for a final or chatting up Stephanie. Simpler times, in some ways, but Tim doesn't regret who he's become. Only being in Gotham itself can even make him nostalgic for the place. Most of the time he remembers what a shithole it is. 

They are halfway through their meal when Tim takes advantage of the momentary lapse in their conversation (Kon is reading a newspaper. A real, printed newspaper.) to zero in on a conversation. Florence is two booths over, talking to a couple. They look middle-aged and happy in general. Not about the conversation. “April just got a bad feeling, you know? She couldn't explain it, but she went in to check on her little boy. He just turned six last week. Had a great birthday party. Themed after those fire dogs.” 

He's not sure what draws him to the conversation. Home town charm? No. It's Florence's tone. Like she's telling a ghost story. “Anyway, April gets out of bed. And she really should be in bed because her shift here was in four hours-” Okay, so April is another waitress. “But something just drew her into her son's room.”

“Then what happened?” The man at the booth asks and Tim honestly can't tell if he's genuinely interested or simply being polite. There's almost zero inflection in his tone. 

“She saw someone hovering over him! Poor little guy was terrified. Wasn't even yelling, he was just crying!” 

“Oh my God. What did she do?” That's the female patron and she does sound genuinely shocked. 

Florence has an audience. The couple in the booth and Tim. Another worker is standing there scowling as she buses a table. The waitress shakes her head, clearly pleased they are hanging on her words. “Of course April screamed bloody murder. Then the man over him? Just disappeared! She grabbed her baby and ran but the cops couldn't find him, of course.” The old woman shakes her head, refilling a mug with coffee that looks thick enough to be mud. “Police said it might've been that serial killer! The one who is active again. Who steals and kills babies for their parents to find.” 

Tim can't blame the woman in the booth for looking afraid. The man's eyes are slightly widened. “Didn't the police do anything?”

The waitress shakes her head. “Warned her that once the killer scopes out a victim he usually comes back for the kid. She went to stay with her mom in her place upstate. Said she's not coming back until she's sure her baby is safe. Not that I blame her. No mother would.” 

Tim doesn't blame her either. Money or no, he would have run as far and as fast as possible with his child. “The killer just disappeared?” Tim asks, his voice slightly raised so she can hear him. He's tempting fate by having Florence come back to their table. That draws Kon's attention and he slowly lowers his paper with a curious expression. 

She's only too happy to approach, sitting on the edge of the bench Kon is seated on and scooting over. It physically makes Kon move, big as he is. Tim catches sight of the face of the other nearby waitress and almost grimaces. “She looks...unhappy.” Okay, maybe not unhappy. Oddly intense at them. 

Florence snorts. “That's Jennifer. Always something off about that girl.” She wants to continue the story “The cops said the killer must've jumped out the window! But she lives five floors up and can you imagine that fall?” Tim stares at her name tag. It looks like it says Fonce, it's so old. “She was so upset when she came to get her last paycheck. Her little boy, too. Kept talking about the man whose mouth smelled like pennies and had needle teeth.”

“Kids exaggerate,” Kon says, cutting Tim off before he can jump to any conclusion. “That's so terrible, though. I hope the little boy is alright.” 

The old waitress nods. “I think he'll do okay. So scary what can happen when we turn our backs just for a minute!” 

“It is,” Kon commiserates and look at Tim like Tim is a child he might one day have to rescue from the jaws of a demon. A demon Kon will deny is actually a demon even as it sizzles and growls and tells him it is from Hell, Tim thinks. 

“Do you think it's a serial killer?” he asks, trying to sound casual as he keeps eating his waffles. No sense in letting them go to waste, even if he's excited. Not over what happened, that would be sick, but to know that this child was saved and there's a witness.

If anything, she seems thrilled that her opinion is being asked. “I think it's the same thing,” Florence agrees. “The one that was killing kids ten years ago? I think he's back. But I don't think it's just a normal man.” 

Kon has the decency not to shriek over a possible lead but he looks like he very much wants to do so. “What do you think it is?” Tim questions. 

A sigh spills from the old woman's lips. “Nothing good,” she replies. “Nothing human. You know this happened fifty years ago, too? But no one talks about that.” 

“I want to talk about it,” Tim says and he's already pulling out his phone, texting the records custodian in their office to start pulling cases with a similar feel from around fifty years ago. “Here in Gotham?” She nods and he adds that information.

“You remember any of the names from back then?” Kon questions her. He's clearly thinking along the same lines Tim is. He loves it when they perfect their mind meld, even if Kon will no doubt be searching for a copycat killer instead of anything supernatural.

A sad head shake is the answer. “Can't say I do. It wasn't widely reported back then. We didn't talk about that stuff. My husband, God rest his soul, found one of the victims on his way home from work one morning. He worked the late shift in the factory, you know? But we weren't married then.” She sighs.

“Sweetest girl,” Florence continues, unfazed by their lack of agreement. “We saw her at church on Sundays. She was friends with everyone and had the kindest spirit. She even took care of a few of the orphans in the afternoon! Two of them were with her when it happened...not a hair on their heads was harmed. Of course my daddy never let me walk home alone again after that.”

Witnesses. There were more witnesses. Witnesses from fifty years ago but that wasn't so long, all things considered. Tim's heart starts to beat faster in his chest and he's pretty sure it's from excitement and not the caffeine from coffee-sludge. “Andrea Bryant? Arella Bryant? Something like that. That was her name.” Florence glances up. There's someone waiting at the cash register. “Sorry, boys. I wish I could be more help.” She pauses. “Are you writing a novel? One of those true crime things?”

Kon smiles, all boyish charm. “We're just nosy. Thanks for sitting with us.” Those farm-boy manners are good for picking up the slack.

Tim is frantically texting the research assistant. He's tried to access the archives on his phone before and been summarily scolded for it. Verified equipment on verified lines only. He needs the information sent to him and encrypted before he can go through it and he finds that fact intensely frustrating.

His partner starts to poke at his waffles, which are pretty soggy by now. He's going to eat them anyway. It's something Tim's proud to have taught him. Tim hardly grew up poor and there were no clean your plate rules at his dinner table, but often times he clears out a specific amount of time to eat. He needs to eat as much as possible in those time frames so he doesn't starve later when he's working frantically on a case. Years of experience have taught him that. 

“This doesn't appear in any of the police reports,” Kon says. “Not from Gotham police. Not from the agents who investigated this ten years ago. I looked over it several times to find witnesses. No one ever saw a thing, according to the reports. The aftermath, but never the actual act.” 

Tim trusts Kon's ability to read through the reports. He's methodical and has a great eye for detail. “Any stories like the one she just told us?”

It has his partner shaking his head but before he can reply Jennifer walks by, her shoes making almost no sound on the floor. He stays silent and she flips the ticket onto their table, fixing Tim with a blank stare. “Have a nice day.” She stalks off.

Kon seems unfazed. “The first murder was only twenty two years ago, according to the files, and they're not even sure it was the same perpetrator. It was a working class kid. Left on the floor of the garage where his dad worked. The one after that was a more complicated ransom scheme. The cops seemed to think of it as a practice for what happened with Jason Wayne.”

Tim remembers reading about each case, but it had been superficial reading. Noting the manner of death. The inconsistencies. Marking which needed to be looked into more for clues that would mean the killer would be after Jason again. There's been nothing about the orphans or the little girl in his reading, either. “I put in a request for the information,” Tim tells him. 

“Then there's nothing to do but wait.” Kon stands up to head to the cash register. “Why don't you try to get a hold of Jason Wayne?”

Why indeed? Tim frowns at his cell phone like it might bite him. He's not sure why it makes him so nervous to simply call; an interview with Jason is what they've been desperately after anyway. He knows they are going to be in contact because of Roy so it won't be much of a surprise.

He steps outside to call. As helpful as Florence was, he doesn't need her honing in on this conversation and repeating it to anyone. He presses the call button before he can second guess himself. 

“Hello?” Male voice. Deep. Kind of throaty in a way that Tim loves. 

“May I ask who I am speaking with?” Always verify first. That's been drilled into his head, especially when he wants to leap right to his questions. 

“You called me,” The voice points out. “But this is Jason Wayne.” 

“Mr. Wayne, I'm Agent Drake with the FBI. We're in contact because-” 

“Yeah. I know. My life is in danger. It's why there are four bodyguards who look like they could all win a professional wrestling match traipsing around after me.” The sigh sounds exaggerated even on the phone. “Agent Drake? Are you the big, grumpy one who hates roombas or the conspiracy theorist one who looks adorable in glasses?”

Tim is pretty sure that Roy has never seen him in glasses, and where else could Jason have gotten that information? Wait, no. He doesn't look adorable in glasses. “I love roombas,” he replies after a moment. He can't seem flustered. 

“Oh good,” Jason says. “I'm planning to get our butler a synchronized army of them for Christmas.” 

This is not how he imagined this conversation going. He's entertained. He's intrigued. He's not at all getting to the point he needs to get to with a man whose life is on the line. “I was wondering if we could meet, Mr. Wayne. Your father suggested you weren't open to it but Mr. Harper said you would be.” 

“Once again, Roy knows me better,” Jason replies. “You'd think I was Rapunzel locked in a tower with the way Bruce is treating me. It's finally starting to make sense.” 

“If you think your life is in imminent danger,” Tim begins. “Then we can come to you.” Is Bruce right to be this paranoid? Tim's never actually thought of it this way. TA killer is legitimately after Jason and he's suggesting he meet him in a public place. He probably needs to go back to FBI Remedial School.

Jason snorts. “I'll be out and about anyway. I know a place that's pretty safe. You like coffee?”

It's a vast understatement, and it's said in such a teasing way that Tim thinks Roy must have told him that too. “I could be convinced,” he says coolly and is rewarded with a chuckle. He's not certain why it feels so much like a reward. It's pleasant and like he knows him already, somehow. Well, knows him more recently than passing as kids.

Jason names the place and the time, about two hours from now. Tim agrees, because there's no reason to refuse. Kon can provide security. They'll keep Jason safe, if there's any trouble. 

He's barely hung up when his partner joins him again, lightly bumping him with his shoulder in a way that means he's trying to be friendly. Kon language isn't so hard to translate. “What's the word?”

“We have a meeting. He's ditching his private security so you might have to play bodyguard. Think you can manage?”

Kon nods and they start their trek to the car. Tim's not sure what they'll do for two hours, but they'll find something. “As long as I don't have to carry anyone out bridal style to a Whitney Houston song then I'll be great.” 

“I'm proud of you for that pop culture reference,” Tim responds and bumps his shoulder against Kon's arm in return. 

~*~*~

"I'm not crazy, you know." That's the first thing Jason offers him when they sit down in the little coffee house. It's an out of the way place, populated by a variety of exhausted and harried looking people. Everything on the menu is unique, and relatively cheap, and Tim kind of hopes the place never goes the way of a corporate buy out. He's glad he didn't wear a suit, because Jason in some torn jeans and a paint-covered t-shirt looks more at home here than anywhere and he's hate to stand out.  

Kon is outside, looking like he's enjoying a mixed lemonade and tea drink, but Tim can tell by his posture he's vigilantly watching for anything that might be dangerous to Jason. From the wink the other man had given him as he entered the place, it's safe to to assume he knows Kon is his partner.

"I never thought you were," Tim answers and doesn't even feel bad lying about it. He's still not sure Jason Wayne isn't a little crazy, but the smirk Jason offers him lets him know it's alright to feel that way. "You've become a basic shut in, though. Since your father brought you home again." 

Jason smirks at that and sips his tea. It's something plainer, more basic than the coffee with blueberries that Tim just had to try and not just to banish the memory of the bad coffee at his meal earlier. "I get out. I even started working though I make sure very few people hear about it. I'm out now, aren't I? And I had to dodge a whole lot of security to do it. I just don't advertise."

Tim has to admit that's the truth. Jason is out in public and he isn't looking frantic. If anything, he's looking a little too at ease as he doesn't have socks on with his tennis shoes. His hair is a little too long for how curly it appears to be and he has the shadows under his eyes of a man who doesn't sleep well. Or possibly at all. On closer inspection, it's rather like he's impersonating someone who does this often. Jason might be working but he's certainly not socializing. "Should I cut right to the chase or would you like some more small talk?"

"The question of my sanity is small talk?" He counters with an easy smile that is as fake as his father's. "I see how it is. But by all means." He gestures at the documents Tim has brought, stacked on their little table. None of the tables in this place match. They've selected one tucked into a corner which is the fairest approximation of privacy they can get.

"I think your life may be in danger Mr. Way- can I call you Jason, actually?" It's difficult for him to reconcile Bruce's visage with the young man sitting in front of him even if he knows Jason's adopted and he shouldn't expect any physical similarities. 

"Yeah." It's a slow drawl, the hints of an accent that's not upper-crust Gotham peeking out. Tim kind of likes it. It makes his stomach flutter uncomfortably, like the man's easy smirk. 

"Jason," Tim repeats. "I think your life might be in danger. At the very least we have a serial killer who might want to finish the job on you. At the worst?" He has to be cautious what he says here. He doesn't want to send Jason out of here. He needs to still be able to protect him. "I'm not sure it's human and I think it needs to feed.”

"Feed," Jason repeats carefully. "Like an animal?"

"Sort of. Like demons. Like evil spirits. Even witches or similar.” Tim watches the man across from him carefully for a reaction. He knows if Kon were in ear shot that he would be in trouble for going off half-cocked on this. “I'm jumping ahead. Your life is in danger. From what side remains to be seen, but whoever tried to murder you...whatever tried to murder you...it is active again. There have been deaths.” 

Jason has gone still. He's half a shade paler, but trying to act normal, Tim thinks. Trying to be calm and reasonable. He sympathizes with him and he regrets his own words suddenly. He's speaking so casually about something that had to be incredibly traumatizing. 

"You know a lot about this shit," Jason replies, instantly trying to inject humor back in the situation.. Then his mind seems to click back to what Tim said earlier and it fades away. "You said there are others? Other victims?”

“A couple,” Tim confirms. He wonders how Bruce manages to keep this sort of news from him and if it's really necessary. Jason's always seemed strong. Quick to anger, but clever as well. Then again, a lot has changed from the boy he sort of knew and the man sitting with him now. “I have some theories. But the basic facts of this? You survived and everyone knows you survived and that makes you a target.”

The other man seems to take it all in stride. He appears calm, even. “What are your theories?” He asks. “What about this demonic influence that's after me, if that's what it is? What does it want?”

It's not the path Tim expects this to go down. Jason doesn't call him crazy. He doesn't even scoff and dismiss him. “You,” Tim replies simply. “In one theory it just wants you. It wants your suffering because you prevented it last time.”

Jason nods, like he hears this all the time and what Tim's told him is something completely and entirely reasonable to him. But then Roy Harper exists in his world. The man's been touched by the other side, and it's as evident in his mannerisms as in the white streak in his hair.

“I don't have a lot to go on right now,” Tim says. Why does he keep talking? He keeps babbling, trying to reassure Jason. He's not at all cool and collected like an FBI agent should be, especially one responsible for another person's safety and life. Jason's teal eyes are steady on him and he feels like he could drown in them. Or at least melt into them. What is wrong with him? Now is not the time for a crush to rear its ugly head. “We're investigating and trying to find a way to stop it.”

“And I bet your psychics told you that I'm involved somehow,” Jason guesses. Tim is stunned and he's sure he looks it. There's no time to school his expression into anything approaching neutrality. Jason, meanwhile, grins. “I've been interrogated before. When it happened.” No question on the fact that the it he's referencing is his supposed death. “You're way better looking than the agent they sent that time though. He also didn't bring up demons. Something about an international trafficking ring?”

Tim's read about the case. It had been solved eventually, with nothing to do with Jason. Early on they'd thought perhaps his kidnapping had been a part of it, staged to look like the work of another when something went wrong. He also knows Jason's interview had been far from helpful; he'd been barely aware at the time. Tim is kind of surprised he remembers it at all. 

Wait. Did he just say he was good looking? Who was the agent on that case? An attractive one?

He hides his swirling thoughts behind another long drink of coffee. It's good and he can taste the blueberries. He wiggles his toes in his shoes, feeling a little tension ease. It's always like this in the thick of things for him; tension and dead ends. “Your father gave a few statements and asked that you be left alone,” Tim tells him. “So you were.” 

It's as simple as that, really. Bruce obviously had some pull with the right people and what was there to do at the time? A miracle had taken place, and everyone wanted to leave it at that. Especially when the killer hadn't killed again after Jason. They'd been only too happy to let it drop.

“Figures.” Jason stares down at the table for a moment. “How are you planning to protect me?”

Tim feels somehow like he's come into this interview woefully under prepared. He's launched half-baked theories at Jason. He's told him his life is in danger but not how to fix it. And when confronted with Jason's question? “I don't know,” Tim admits. “We need to figure out what happened to you first and who kidnapped you in order to protect you from it. If you could prove any information-” 

“I don't remember.” His voice is flat. “Those years are a blur to me. I remember very little of my life around the time it happened and nothing after it for probably a year. Even Bruce finding me again is hard to remember.” There's something there, beneath the surface., Tim thinks. Anger. Frustration. He doesn't believe Jason laments the way his life has gone, but he definitely can see the rage beneath the surface over what happened to him. He certainly has a good reason to feel that way. “I can't be much help for you to catch this monster.” His gaze lifts. “Human or no? It was a monster who did that. Who is doing it now.”

Tim's heard him described that way over and over. A monster. But there's something haunted in Jason's gaze as he says it and something protective in the way he holds himself. He remembers more than he's letting on. But Tim, at least, has the sense not to pry. Not right now. Not about the worst day of (and possible end to) someone's life.

“If we know who or what it is then we can protect you better,” he says. “I'm sure you've hired great private security but Kon- Agent Kent and I are better.” He's unsure where this need comes from. It's a fierce urge to protect Jason Wayne. Maybe it stems from the kid he'd known once, who had given him a wave. Maybe it's the fact that Tim has been basically obsessed with this case since he first got access to it. 

“Has anyone ever told you that you're insane?” Jason questions. Tim stiffens, because people have, and it's rarely ended well for him. “I love it,” the other man continues with a brief smirk that doesn't quite wipe away the exhaustion on his face. “I love that you believe there are things that go bump in the night.”

“Day too,” Tim replies, trying to make a joke. “The first mistake is thinking they only come out at night.” 

Jason's chuckle is rich and rewarding, even if it is a little weak. “Of course I wouldn't think that. You and I are here aren't we?” He lifts his mug of tea up in a mock salute before taking another drink. “What do you want to do to me right now?” He asks and Tim has visions of dragging Jason across the table and kissing him. Which isn't like him in the least. He's a bit puzzled by how intensely he feels the want. “To protect me.”

The clarification roots Tim's mind back somewhat in serial killers and demonic influences. As usual, he's put the cart before the horse and the horse has run the other direction. “I was hoping you would have some ideas,” he admits. “There's no rhyme or reason to the killer's pattern. It seems like Wayne Manor might be the safest place for you.” 

Jason stares at Tim's hands and into his coffee mug, which is nearly empty. “I wasn't there when he took me the first time, no,” He agrees softly. “I remember a church. I think I had it in mind to ask the priest for help. But no one was there.” His brow furrows and creases. Tim wants to smooth it out. He wants to help, somehow. He doesn't want to press for information and wanting to back off is a new sensation for him. “Bruce says the sight of steeples made me scream for months after he found me. And that covering the windows gave me fits...I always wanted one open. But I don't remember that.” 

Tim knew Bruce had been holding out on him. He wonders what other information the man might have, but then he supposes he doesn't want to violate Jason's trust. He's spent this long staunchly protecting him when he felt he couldn't do so before. 

“I'd rather die,” Jason confides. “I'd rather die than ever let him touch me again.” His hands ball into fists and press down, grinding against the surface of the table. “Is that strange? That I don't remember it but the thought still makes my skin crawl? That I feel so strongly about never being near it again?”

“Of course not.” Tim's attention is drawn to Kon standing up, signaling to him that someone is watching them. He turns to see a man with dark glasses, very focused on their table.

“But if it's a demon? Is that a sign? Just an aversion to it?” Jason's gaze catches Tim and strays as well. “Oops. Looks like one of the pro-wrestlers caught up with me. There are only a few places I run to outside of the office.” 

Tim gives the signal for an all clear before Kon jumps the guy. He doesn't want them to get into a brawl here. The coffee shop is so nice and pleasant and it would be a shame to make their insurance premiums go up. “I think it would be normal no matter who did it,” Tim replies. “It was a trauma even if you managed to escape.” 

“You sound like a therapist. It's surprising. You didn't give me a warm, fuzzy sensation when I first met you.” Jason is already scooting his chair back. 

“That was because I hadn't had my afternoon cup of coffee yet. I'm far more personable when caffeinated.” Tim wants that lightness back to the conversation. He wants that curve of Jason's lips. 

He doesn't quite get a smile, but he gets some of the shadow out of his teal eyes. “You drank coffee when you were nine years old? That's kind of impressive. But I waved at you and you just kind of twitched. Shy kid?”

 _He remembers._ Tim is alternately elated and horrified. He's sure he's gaping like a fish as Jason's bodyguard starts to approach them. Even more so when Jason leans over the table. 

“I dream about it sometimes. But it's been more often lately.” His words are quick, his head tilted to watch the approach of the man with dark glasses. “In the dreams? I don't escape. It's me he murdered. I'm the corpse they found. I don't know if it really happened to me.” 

Tim wants to tell him of course it didn't. He has his fingers. His jaw hasn't been all but ripped off. He thinks of the coffin. He remembers note about claustrophobia on Jason's limited medical records. Then the man is standing up to greet the bodyguard, his shoulders lax with a false ease. “Alright, take me back. I'll go quietly. Keep in touch, Agent.” 

Tim is still staring as Jason is walked out, indeed, like he's under arrest. He somehow doubts Jason Todd Wayne has ever gone quietly anywhere in his life. Not even death.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Reviews/Comments/Prompts always appreciated here or [here](http://strikeyourcolors.tumblr.com/ask) . Thanks for reading!


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> These are the chapters that never eeeeeend. 
> 
> Warnings for this chapter include basically the warnings for the fic at large. Discussion of murders, brutality, mentions of suicide, and descriptions of injuries and blood. 
> 
> There's also bonding and cuddling in case that needs a warning.

Tim fills Kon in on his conversation with Jason as they head back to Tim's apartment. His partner seems as troubled by Jason's admission as he is, which is somewhat reassuring that his emotional thermometer is set on human. At least until his partner opens his mouth, of course. “You think it was a metal breakdown of some kind? Like he's gone totally insane and that's why his dad kept him locked up for so long?”

It's not hard to feel offended on Jason's behalf. “No! I think maybe the guilt that some other kid got killed has burrowed beneath his skin. Or that...it really was him.” 

“How?” Kon questions flatly. “How would that work? You've seen the autopsy photos. That kid was completely butchered.” 

It's true. Still, Tim frowns. “He's not crazy, though. Troubled yeah but who isn't?” He heaves a sigh, staring out the window as he jingles his keys, hunting out the two for his apartment. 

“I think you're taking it a little personally.” And Kon, damn him, is right. Tim sees a lot of himself in Jason. He also sees evidence of all his work and all the things he wants to believe in. Tim's been teased a lot, bullied even more, and called crazy. 

He always has to remind himself no one's seen all the things he has. There's more horrible things lurking out there and not all of them are deterred by daylight.

The elevator is out in his apartment building because this is Gotham and of course it is. He and Kon have to hoof it up the stairs to the tenth floor. “You really need to get rid of this thing,” Kon pants. He's in better shape than Tim, who pretty much was ready to pass out on the fifth floor. He's laid over the handrail and is dragging himself up. Still, ten sets of stairs is a lot to go up. “It's nice when we're here but how much do you pay for it plus your place in D.C.?”

“Just pay...taxes...inherited it...” Tim gasps out. His head contacts the heavy wood of his door and he lifts the keys. One for the deadbolt and one for the knob. It's not like he's in a particularly crime-ridden area of Gotham but, well, it's Gotham. He's also pretty sure the apartment's door had been set up this way for cleaning staff in his father's day. It's what he uses it for now; he can lock the knob when he's here or doesn't want them to come inside since they only have the key to the deadbolt. 

“Don't take this the wrong way but I'm starting to suspect you're some type of black widow.” Kon is first into the apartment, dumping his overnight back in the alcove near the kitchen before heading into the living room. Tim drags himself in behind him, kicking the door shut and managing only to get to the couch before flopping over the back of it. He doesn't dignify Kon with a response, and he can barely take off the messenger bag around his shoulder. 

He shifts and his back crackles and pops in at least eight different places. Kon shudders. “I wouldn't be a very good black widow if all I got out of it was rent money,” Tim counters. This apartment used to be high-end but not so much any more. Drake Industries moved on to a more chic district of Gotham as money changed hands and buildings developed and the extra apartment of a former owner hadn't moved with it.

Kon is leaning against a wall, still pretending not to be winded. “Maybe you don't want to look too successful and avoid suspicion.” 

“Tell me when I am fitting in time to go black widow in between my case load and being forced into social interaction,” Tim grouses. 

“By social interaction you mean trying to find energy vampires and infiltrate their meeting?” Kon asks. “I'm pretty sure you were going to join their ranks.”

“That was one time!” Oh, God, it hurts to laugh. Tim has to focus on breathing. He sheds the strap of his messenger bag and wiggles onto the couch properly so it is no longer compressing his diaphragm. He might argue more but suddenly the fax machine blares to life, loud and obscenely annoying in his quiet apartment. 

Looking over to it, he sees a stack of papers already on the floor where they shot out of it. Really, he wishes the people at archives would warn him before they start sending him stuff so he can at least put a blocker on the end of the machine. “I can't believe you still have one of those with as techy as you are," Kon comments.

“Fax machines are still one of the most secure ways to send confidential information,” Tim replies. He'd kept the land line in the apartment for sentimental reasons, as loathe as he is to admit it, but it's so useful for things like this. Or it would have been if the papers remained neatly stacked instead of overflowing the shallow tray. 

He scoots over to the machine, still printing, to start to put the papers in order. It must be one of the researchers who likes him, because they're numbered. The copies aren't great; clearly pulled out of old material. They're readable and that's all that really matters. “Abigail Bryant,” he tells Kon after catching sight of the name of a victim. “I guess Florence's story wasn't made up.” 

“No chance of you black widowing her now that she's been useful,” Kon agrees. “Doesn't look like we have much.” And it speaks to experience that he sees maybe fifty pages of and assumes that isn't much information. That's usually how things go for them. They have to harvest an incredible amount to hit on anything valuable.

He scans the pages. As desperate as he is to delve into them, his conversation with Jason has left him exhausted (or maybe that was the walk to the apartment) and a little melancholy. He wants to wind down. He wants to think and process everything he's learned so far. Still, this is important. “Abigail Bryant,” he repeats. “She was twenty-one. Married. Daughter of a prominent businessman at the time. She volunteered at the hospital and orphanage...” 

There's no point in reading it all out loud. He shuffles the documents and places them firmly to the side. “Let's get set up before we start.” 

The set up means computers out and refreshments in easy reach. They make certain the doors are secured and that background noise is comfortably playing from the television or the stereo. It means they get into more comfortable clothes and then they work. It's how they make most major breakthroughs. Tim feels like he's been awake for days, yet it's barely dinner time. 

“Not that I'm complaining,” Kon begins. “But this is usually peak time for you and my eardrums feel like they're on fire from how many theories you're suggesting. What gives?”

Of course he knows something is wrong. If only he knew what because then he could tell Tim. He shrugs, then sighs, running a hand through his hair. “I don't know,” he admits. He'll only say those words to his partner. Kon might tease but doesn't judge and he never mocks him, no matter how off the wall his theories might be. “Something about this case just gets to me. It has its claws in me but not in the way that makes me...” 

“Manic,” Kon supplies. He's been witness to Tim tearing through research materials and dashing through the apartment to his wall with its collection of strings and photographs for the grand scheme of things. 

“Yeah,” Tim agreed. “It's like the opposite. Like I just don't want to know. It's all just so sad. I don't even know why it hits me this way.”

Kon sits on the sofa and pats it. Tim reluctantly trudges over; his partner has played therapist so many times for him before. “I mean, it involves kids getting killed in horrible ways. That's pretty sad.”

“I've dealt with worse,” Tim argues. “I compartmentalize. I move on. It should inspire me to want to get this done more quickly, if anything. Somehow it doesn't. I want to go back to the office and pick another case. But more than that, I want to save Jason. I want to protect him.” 

A large hand reaches out and settles on his forehead. “You don't have a fever,” Kon announces. “So maybe you're growing up. Burn out is a thing, man. You've been going nonstop since that ghost at the pier case you worked over a year ago. You don't even take weekends off. And this? It's hitting close to home, isn't it? Not just because we're in Gotham.” 

Tim has to consider that. Gotham does bring up memories for him but it's more than that. It's more than who he was as a kid, or who he knew. He sees a lot of who he could have been had he stayed here. “I'm not giving up though.” If he says it enough maybe it will stick. “We'll get set up and get started. I'll find something. I have to.” 

He can tell Kon is frowning without even looking. Tim peels himself off the sofa after a moment of just basking in Kon's attention. He has a way of soothing, of coaxing, that he finds relaxing. He also gives one hell of a shoulder massage and he might demand one later, depending on how their research goes. 

“Take a shower,” his friend suggests because he knows that always calms him down and refocuses him. “I'll get some snacks. Get out the delivery menus for later.” 

Tim nibbles his lower lip and casts one more longing glance at the fax machine, shrieking as it receives another page. There's no point in getting started right now without a full file, is there? “You're too good to me,” he teases, but he half means it. Maybe more than half. He really does not deserve Conner Kent as a partner. The flip side also applies, but in the negative way. It's a miracle Kon hasn't asked to be transferred by this point. 

Kon only waves him off, already picking up his phone to go through it. Tim trudges into his bedroom to shower off the day. It prevents arguments in the morning over who gets to shower first and, anyway, the bathroom is a place they spared no expense on in the apartment. He loves the heated stone walls and the water jets and it only sometimes freaks him out that the doors are glass and the water pressure is strong enough that it sometimes makes him feel like he's drowning. Better to drown in water than emotional turmoil. 

The shower does revive him somewhat. Jason's dropped a bombshell on him. He somehow thought this would be a case of watching Jason Wayne until a demon or serial killer turned up. But of course nothing is ever simple.

Fuck, he's starting to sound like Kon. He's not sure how his partner's attitude has infiltrated his thoughts so thoroughly. And, of course, there's Jason. I don't know if it really happened to me. Not uncommon after a trauma. Not even uncommon, Tim's read, after a bout of amnesia that the mind starts trying to fill in the gaps. He read one case where a woman was convinced the events of a book she was reading at the time of an accident were actually the events of her life.

He presses his face against the warm tiling of a shower wall and lets the water blast away his sins and a little of his tension. Focus. Calm. Tim's found that meditation is difficult and not that rewarding for him; he can't really turn his brain off without falling asleep. But some of the principles of it were helpful for when his thoughts were too scattered to continue. 

It's all Jason Wayne's fault, really. Tim's not sure how exactly, but it is. Maybe he was too attractive. His eyes were too pretty. He was too wounded, too broken, wrapped up in a package Tim finds pushes all his buttons to an outrageous degree. But, then again, so does Kon. Kon as since he first met him and they've never ended up dating. They've had conversations eluding to the man being bisexual but he's not entirely sure what his current status is. He can control himself. He knows his limits and one of those limits is that his life is too much of a crazy, paranoid disaster to ever include someone else in it full time. He'd learned that with Stephanie. 

It's far too easy for his thoughts to stray to her. Stephanie Brown had given him his first real kiss. She'd been his first real, steady friend. After his mom had died and with his dad struggling to come to terms with the overwhelming grief, it had felt only natural to ask Stephanie to marry him. It would have been something happy and stable for Drake Industries in a time of turmoil. The engagement had saved the company; Tim never doubts that. Stephanie had also known he wasn't in love with her since before the engagement; he has no disputes about that either. She'd been a great friend to go along with it. 

Then his father had died and Tim had started having to take over more responsibility for the failing company and the real trouble started. A 'random' mugging that nearly cost Stephanie her life. A malfunctioning elevator. A faulty wire in her kitchen that had set the place ablaze. All signs pointed to someone wanting to distract Tim enough to step down. She had taken it all in stride and even found it kind of entertaining. But Tim couldn't stand it. He'd lost so much and losing her wasn't a risk he was willing to take. 

It wasn't enough to break up with her. That Tim still had affection for her was too easy to see and both the detective and the private investigator he hired when the police detective got no results determined that someone must think she had company secrets. 

Faking her death had been almost too easy. Gotham was corrupt and even a teenager could turn the wheels of it if he was smart enough. He'd asked her where she wanted to go, and surprisingly she had said Cairo. Tim bought her a plane ticket and the next day he reported her missing, with only her blood, one of her running shoes, and a chunk of her hair on a riverbank telling the story of what happened to her. Of course he'd been under police suspicion for a month afterward, but the funny thing about knowing when someone was going missing was that an airtight alibi with plenty of electronic surveillance for back up could be easily secured. 

It was also what had brought him to the attention of Director Lance. She had been at the party Tim attended during the period of time when Stephanie was supposedly kidnapped or murdered. It had been after he was officially cleared by Gotham City police that she had swept in again and asked him to confirm it wasn't some ridiculous tax evasion scheme he was running. 

It had taken time, but she'd worn him down. Dinah knew all along that he hadn't killed Stephanie and that she probably wasn't dead at all. She'd helped him make his move to D.C. after securing the future of Drake Industries and publicly retiring the position of its head to more capable hands. But she'd also never asked what really happened to his former fiancee and taken him on his word that Stephanie was happy elsewhere.

Stephanie's safe, Tim reminds himself. She really is happy and she has a purpose. When she wants to come back, they'll plan for it and spin a story. He's worked had to keep her from being declared legally dead so the paperwork for her will be minimal. 

It doesn't stop him from missing her though. Letters once a week and phone calls twice a month aren't much, but they help to remind Tim that they are still connected no matter the distance. She's still his best friend, even if Kon is slowly moving in to take pieces of his affection. He thinks they'd get along. He hopes, anyway. He also hopes they'll be meeting some day. Soon, preferably. 

Tim is startled back to awareness, enough to squawk in outrage, as the water in the shower blasts a different jet at him. He's set it to do exactly that if he remains in one place for too long, in case he falls asleep, but it always surprises him. Kon's threatened to have the same feature installed on his shower at home and Tim is both eager for and afraid of that time when it comes.

He finishes washing and rinsing off just as the second blast of water attempts to urge him out of the shower. It wasn't exactly a relaxing or calming experience, but Tim finds he's much more clear-headed as he leaves the bathroom. He dries off in his bedroom and selects some sweatpants and a t-shirt. Neither have holes in them, and they aren't grossly oversized, which gives him a small sense of accomplishment. Kon's seen him in way worse condition but he feels the need to remind him that he can take care of himself. Sort of. Mostly. 

Really, Tim knows he's kind of like an impulsive house cat in that he can kind of take care of himself but it's better all around if someone checks in on him. 

He even has his hair brushed by the time he rejoins his partner. The other man has set up their base in his absence. The area around the coffee tables and couches in the living room is cleared of anything not work related. His television is ready to stream whatever they decide upon. The coffee maker is on his kitchen counter and already heating. Bottles of water and snacks that leave no residue (they both still remember the Dorito dust on ancient manuscript incident) have been placed out. The pretzels are in a bowl wide enough that Tim can stick his entire face in it and make one stick to his tongue to eat it, no hands involved. They have great safety precautions, really, even if the things they'll be using tonight are photocopied and electronic. 

Kon's even lit a couple of chai tea scented candles. They blend in well with the laundry detergent Tim uses and the smell of coffee and whatever they decide on for dinner. It's like background noise. Background scent. Something to lull the mind and allow it to focus on details. 

“You can shower if you want,” Tim offers to Kon. I wiped it out and everything.” It's important to note, especially after an unfortunate incident early in their partnership when Tim used a bath oil and Kon nearly killed himself slipping in the tub. 

“I'll take one in the morning like usual,” he replies. “I'm gonna change, though.” And he disappears into the guest room that is more like a storage room since the move to D.C. Tim momentarily laments the fact he won't get to see Kon's glorious ab muscles tonight, but he knows his partner is trying to give him space so he can work himself out of the funk he's in. 

Tim opens a bottle of water because he's had a lot of coffee already and, contrary to popular belief, doesn't want his heart to stop. He plops down on one of the floor pillows beside the coffee table where his laptop is set up. 

Kon emerges in work-out clothes that double as lounging clothes, because apparently those hadn't been things on the farm where he grew up. It's only recently that Tim has convinced him it's acceptable to have clothing that isn't good for work but also isn't pajamas. It had taken him a bout with the flu to accept that it was sometimes alright to go into public in sweatpants. 

“I'm going to start reading the information on Abigail Bryant,” he decides. Kon waits, looking expectant, which means he wants Tim to tell him what to do. Sometimes he has his own direction, his own theories, but apparently not tonight. Still, Tim phrases it like a question. “Do you want to pull information about the confirmed cases? And suspected? Then maybe we can work out a pattern.”

His partner is great at seeing patterns and finding other motivations for crimes than the obvious. He's just not good at blindly believing and while Tim thinks that sometimes balances him out well it can also get incredibly frustrating. He still wouldn't trade Kon for the world even if he's pretty sure he'll eventually be traded in.

Kon selects a zany 90s sitcom for background noise and takes his place at the desk. He sometimes joins Tim on the floor, but mostly he likes to keep some semblance of order. It makes him more efficient. With a glance over at his partner, Tim turns to his own work. 

The background information on Abigail has all the makings of a great media story. She was pretty, blonde and blue-eyed and she looked far younger than she was. The young woman probably should have been nominated for sainthood with all her charitable activities. She married her sweetheart and they lived next door to her parents. One Sunday after church she was taking two of the orphans the church cared for out to do some shopping. Her husband became concerned when she didn't return at the end of the day.

“The next morning a ransom letter was delivered with the milk on her parents' doorstep,” Tim reads out loud for Kon's benefit. “It stated that Mr. Bryant should gather up all the jewelry in the house and arrive at a specific location in all haste. He was to tell no one. Mr. Bryant arrived to find that his daughter was dead, beaten to death with a metal bar after having her ankles and wrists broken. She was still wearing the locket he had given her on her wedding day and the jeweled pins in her hair had been used to stab into her scalp.”

The photographs that accompany the report aren't spectacularly detailed and there's something to be grateful for in that fact. “A note had been left pinned to her body. On it was written the Hebrew form of her first name and the meaning of it.”

Kon shudders. “That's terrible. What about the kids she was with?”

Tim scans the writing. Whoever had initially written the report had relatively clear hand writing, which is a mercy.“The two children were found traumatized but unharmed. They insisted Ms. Bryant had locked them in the pantry of the abandoned house in which she was found and done everything in her power to protect them. One of the children watched through a crack in the door and wept upon giving his account of what transpired.” 

Kon's computer mouse has stopped moving as he contemplates it. “That's it?”

“The FBI didn't pull the full file from the Gotham police. They realized it wasn't what they were looking for at the time and backed out of it. It's listed that the full record is contained in the city's archives. The originals of everything are there too, probably.” Tim ponders for a moment. “They moved everything older than maybe twenty-five years to the Old Archives. Even though it's actually newer construction than where the newer files are kept.” 

“I take it that's on our to do list for tomorrow.” But Kon doesn't sound as put out by it as he once would. He's actually good at research, for all Tim knows he'd rather be in the field. Kon likes blue sky above him and sunshine on his face while he burns if he so much as takes a walk on a cloudy day. He hums an agreement that, yes, it's on their list for tomorrow. He'd like to see what else the Gotham Police discovered. 

The rest of the reading material is pretty much a retelling of the same story with more details added in. The FBI agent's summary manages to be the most concise in the bunch. Tim pauses a few times to run searches on names that are mentioned. Unsurprisingly, Abigail's parents are both dead. She had no siblings. Her husband remarried and died a decade later. The orphans are more difficult to trace since they were adopted and renamed at some point before adulthood. Tim thinks that one of them died as Maria Kyle in her twenties. The other is named Billy Smith and both agents completely not surprised by how many results in Gotham alone a search for that name turns up, even when they limit it to a specific age range. Tim just has to hope the complete file might have more information. 

“It's pretty similar to Jason Wayne,” he says at last after going through the file twice. “I think this might be the first case of this killer.”

“It's a fifty year gap,” Kon points out. “Sixty years if he's also responsible for the most recent. You really think a guy that old is a danger in this case? I mean, he's sure as hell not jumping out any five story windows.” He's thinking of April's story. Tim considers it as well. 

“Unless the killer doesn't have to worry about age,” he replies. “But the metal bar? Breaking wrists and ankles? The ransom to the father, too, and having him be the one to find her.” More than one similarity can be a coincidence but with this many, Tim would find that even more bizarre than a demonic influence. 

Kon turns in his chair, taking a swig out of the bottle of soda he has that Tim has hotly contested as being worse for him than coffee. Either way they are both headed for some tooth damage if they keep indulging in their habits. “Maybe a copycat,” he suggests. “Or a protege.” 

“The details of what happened were never reported. The newspaper articles we have are simply about Abigail's life and the fact she was murdered. If it was a copycat it would have to be someone with the right clearance.” 

“Or someone who heard about it then. Or someone who stumbled on it for a research project. It might not be commonly known but it's not completely unknown.” Kon huffs and Tim can see the layout of a spreadsheet over his shoulder. 

He squints, but the text is far too small to read. “What have you found?”

His partner sounds entirely depressed. “A pattern. If we're looking at one killer, we're looking at over twenty-nine kills in the last fifty years. He tends to go in sudden spikes...three to five a year before he stops completely for a few more years. It made him nearly impossible to track.” Tim hauls himself up to go look at the sheet. Neatly organized, grim material laid out cleanly for him to see the statistics of it. “Method of death varied, but it was never anything quick or clean or painless. Harder to tie the cases together even though most of them were in Gotham.” 

A quick scan of the causes of death shows nothing optimistic for the law enforcement of the past having connected the cases. Most of the victims were beaten to death. A few of them were drowned or left to bleed out. They range in age from a newborn baby to a woman in her thirties. It's all horrific, but what's the common link? In some there are ransom requests and in others no contact at all until the victim's body was found. The ransom is never collected. “There's no motivation,” Tim says though he knows Kon has figured this out. “There's no motivation except wanting his victims to suffer.” 

Jason is the only one who got away with his life and he's been suffering ever since. Jason is in the line of fire once again as a job unfinished. It sends chills down Tim's spine and yet they still have no solid leads on how to protect him. Right now they're as good as the private security that Bruce has surrounding him. 

Unless Tim was led back to Gotham for a reason. Unless that reason is he's the only one who suspects a demon is out to finish the job of stealing Jason Wayne's soul. He must have that odd glint in his eye that signals he's about to go down a rabbit hole he might never come out of, because Kon sighs. “I'm going to order dinner for us. Any preferences?”

“Korean,” Tim decides nearly instantly. He's been craving it since they passed the place on the way here. 

“Am I allowed to go get it if they don't deliver?” The permission, too, is something they've agreed upon. It signals to Tim that Kon now considers this case slightly dangerous, at least enough that they need to double check if they should split up. Interesting. 

“If it's not far,” Tim decides. He's already drifting back to his documents. He flips one of the pages over to start making notes. “Let me know if you find any common links or threads. There has to be something.” 

“Different ages. Sexes. Ethnicity. Economic statuses. Different neighborhoods. But I'll keep looking.” Right after he orders dinner, Tim assumes, because Kon is already punching a number into his phone.

That's fine. Tim is like a bloodhound on a trail. They've determined it can't be the work of one mortal man. That's more than enough for him to work with. He's lost to the research, to pulling up information about the work of copycat killers. However, it's taken the FBI decades to even begin to link all the cases. What are the odds someone else could pick it up enough to continue the work in such a similar way? Therefore if it's more than one person, they must be connected. Tim is thinking less and less this was done by human hands, but he feels obligated to Kon to check out every lead to this end. 

He's starting his research into demons that feed on suffering by the time the food arrives. Every path brings him back to the demon he's already told Kon about. It's rumored to inhabit major cities in more modern times, intent on causing chaos and suffering. There are false starts. Tim remembers the existence of Myspace and how many black garbed teenagers apparently wore face paint and swore their fealty to this demon. Or did once. Most of the accounts are pretty ancient. 

“Earth to Tim,” Kon calls out. Tim knows he should respond, but he's opening another link when the man hurls a stress ball at his face. Pure reflex saves him and he ducks in time for the thing to brush over his hair. 

“I would have been pissed if that hit me in the face,” He informs his partner primly but he doesn't blame him for throwing it. Not at all. He's kind of surprised there are some whole ones still around; Kon used to break at least six of them a week trying to knead his stress with Tim out on them. He's so happy they've worked past that. 

Kon is opening boxes and depositing them on the bar in the kitchen. Apparently he expects Tim to eat like a person instead of like a desperate researcher. “Well it didn't,” he answers. “You want a beer or what?”

“I have a bottle of wine in one of the cooler thingies,” Tim tells him. Kon's not much of a wine person, but he's pretty sure the bottle will go great with bulgogi and Kon does like beef. His partner doesn't even protest, simply opens the wine cooler and gets the bottle out, popping it open and retrieving glasses. “Ugh,” Tim protests upon seeing the number of boxes. “You're trying to make me fat.” It's not a question. He's already put on a few pounds since being partnered with Kon. He knows some of it is actual muscle since he loves taking him to the gym and making him suffer, but a lot of it is the food, too, and the enforcement that he eat it.

The dark-haired man just rolls his eyes. “You're the one who suggested wine and you look better for having a little weight on you. Starvation is not an attractive look. You get all pointy and bird-like. Your cheekbones are nice but not when your cheeks are sunken in. And that little dip in your back? It looks much better framed by muscle.” 

Tim is a little flustered. He can already feeling a smile pulling, unwillingly, at his lips. He ducks his head, then immediately lifts it again because he will not balk! He will not be shy about this. “You notice my cheekbones?” The dip in his back feels too personal, somehow, to mention. 

“Uhm,” Kon answers, busying himself with popping open the containers of food. “I guess everyone does? They're on your face, you know? To look at your face you have to look at your cheekbones.” Is that a blush? Tim can't tell if Kon is red from that or because he just got hit in the face by a giant puff of steam from the rice. 

They eat. They drink. Tim devotes a few minutes to evaluating his relationship with his partner and decides it's decent enough as things are. Now isn't the time to bring up anything else anyway. The food is delicious. Paired with the wine it's even better though Tim is careful not to imbibe too much. Enough to take the edge off his day, to let him work through the case without fixating on any one horror. He's sure Kon is going to do the same. Really their personalities mesh well in this regard. 

But soon enough it's back to work. Back to the laugh track on the television that at least keeps the oppressive silence away. Tim knows better than to make notes about demons by name so he simply creates his own symbol to reference him in the information he finds. Kon clicks away, compiling lists of victim profiles and their circumstances. He has that look on his face that means he is set in this case. That he will find justice for these people. 

It's hours later when Tim feels his eyelids drooping. Kon cuts him off from coffee after dinner, insisting he doesn't need it after having wine and a heavy meal. It's the truth. It still pisses Tim off when he finds himself yawning hugely into his hand. 

“Go to bed,” Kon instructs with a sympathetic look. “We were up early this morning. We'll probably be up early again.” 

“You go to bed,” Tim counters childishly. 

“Dude, I would be right there if I didn't think you would run and plug your coffee maker back up the minute my head hit the pillow.” The man sounds fond. Tim _feels_ fond that he knows him so well because that's exactly the plan that had begun to form in his mind and is now thwarted before it even had a chance to take root. 

The fifteen minutes he lasts are pure spite at Kon telling him to go to bed, before he shuts down the computer. He sets his security alarm and mutters something like a goodnight before snatching his phone and shuffling off to his bedroom. The sheets are clean and he sinks gratefully into them, face first.

It's only a few minutes before his partner stops in the doorway to his room. “Goodnight Tim,” Kon says with a chuckle before he moves in the general direction of the guest room. He has already decided not to think about demons before slumber takes him, but he doesn't have time to think about anything at all before he's asleep. 

Tim knows he's dreaming. He always knows he is when he sees his old house. Oracle had tried teaching him lucid dreaming to control and change them to suit what he wants, but he was never particularly good at it. Still, the ability to recognize a dream for what it is remains helpful even if he is a puppet on strings during them. 

He wonders for a moment which dream it will be. There's one about being late for his college finals that somehow begins in his childhood bedroom. There's another where he's looking for his mother and he actually kind of enjoys that one, because her face remains perfectly etched in his mind and it's almost as good as actually seeing her. Sometimes photographs in the waking world simply don't hold up.

The sky outside his window is dark, though, so Tim knows it's not that dream. He takes a moment simply to study his childhood room. It's something that exists only in his mind; something that will never exist again. He wishes he could photograph it or sketch it out, because he's well aware the memories are going to fade with time and however much he runs from it he never wants to forget where he came from. 

Then the scream comes from downstairs, and Tim knows which dream this is. It's not one he's had in a while. "Dad?" He calls out. "Dad, are you okay?" He doesn't want to go. He doesn't want to look. But he walks out of his room anyway and down the stairs. This part isn't accurate; he'd been out on a date with Stephanie and come home to find the scene. He hadn't been upstairs in his room. He hadn't approached it from this angle, with such utter clarity of what he's about to find. 

The dining room is in disarray. The table has been pushed against the open archway that leads into the formal living room. The doors to the kitchen are shut and locked while the dining room chairs have been stacked against the window and the china cabinet has tipped over against them. "Dad?" Tim yells again. That's in the script, but he wasn't coming down the stairs when he yelled that word in reality. He shuts his eyes a moment and _wills_ himself to be past this part. He wants to wake up and not be hovering in some strange layout of his not-house. 

He remembers coming in through the front door, having to choose to go up over the table or under it, and choosing to crawl under it because his dad was on the floor. He'd pinched his finger against the leg of it as he swung under, badly enough that he still has a little scar. 

Jack Drake is kneeling on the floor in the dining room. In front of him is something bright and glowing a sickly orange shade like fluorescent paint under a black light or new traffic cones in headlights. Tim tries to detach from the scene. He's not under the table, is he? He can see the scene with the detachment that comes from knowing he can do nothing instead of blind panic. The orange glow is coming from a circle, drawn on the antique wood flooring in chalk. There's a bowl of water and a candle. It's the bowl his mother used to use for popcorn on the rare occasion they watched a movie together. Tim can see a book that looks old and half-damaged sitting beside his father. 

And, of course, the pool of blood is there. The sleeves of his father's white button-down have been pulled up to his biceps, and his wrists have been slit from above his elbow to the base of his palm. The blood glows in the light, too, reflecting the flickers of it like water and flame. Tim didn't know what the light meant, then. The feeling of sickness, of panic, that washed over him had been telling enough. 

Just like that, he's under the table. He's back into the position he was and he surges forward even though he knows he shouldn't. He's screaming for Steph, hoping she hasn't gone far. Call help. Call 911. But, this time, instead of staring at his father he looks into the circle of light. There are _eyes_ there. There's a wicked grin and fingers that beckon him and start to inch toward him from a line of chalk. 

"Janet," Jack murmurs, reaching out as well. "Janet, what have I done?" His voice is weak in a way Tim hasn't ever heard. The puddle of blood edges closer to the circle and the face in the flames licks its lips. 

"Dad!" he screams again. Jack throws himself forward, toward the circle, but Tim is in the way. He dives to catch his father, his knee flipping the bowl of water onto the floor. There's an unholy screech, one that isn't coming from any human mouth, and the water washes away the chalk outline. 

The light disappears. Tim is left trying to prop his father upright, the sticky warmth of his blood soaking into the new jeans he bought specifically for this date. His dad is already cold and ashen but he pulls his arms over his head to reduce the bleeding anyway, wondering if he can tie a tourniquet. He has a belt. His dad has a belt. If he can just keep him alive, the hospital isn't far away. 

Stephanie appears beside him, an angel of mercy in this crisis. She has her phone crushed to her ear and she's crying. Tim isn't. He feels numb. Shocked. Steph helps him get his dad leaning against the wall and keeps his arms above his heart. She's wrapped the material of the sleeve of her coat around one of his arms. "Apply pressure to the other one! Is he breathing?"

"Tim," Jack murmurs, head rolling to the side. His eyes seem strange, like the color has been bled out of them already. "Need you to know. It's not your fault." 

Tim's clutching his father's other wrist, trying to use the sleeve of his own jacket to hold the wound closed. "He's breathing," Stephanie says into the phone. "Oh my God, please hurry."

"I love you. Like your mother loves you." Jack's breath rattles in his chest. Tim is caught staring at his face, transfixed. His dad has looked older since the accident that disabled him and killed his wife, but this is like every good thing has been stripped away from him in an instant. "I didn't mean...for this. To do this. Couldn't control..." 

Tim is desperate to pull away from the dream. He doesn't want to relive this night and doesn't want to remember this is the last moment he sees his father. He knows how it ends. Tim knows the paramedics will come, and Jack will be admitted to the hospital. He knows he'll cling to life for a solid hour before they call it, even if what was left of his father died in the dining room.

The room is just as it was that night; Tim's mind is a trap for details. He looks at the chalk symbols on the floor that he now knows is a summoning circle. He sees the ribbon that used to hold a lock of his mother's hair, which has burned to ash. The edges of her picture, just outside the circle, are singed. Blood soaks into it, into the book, erasing any writing that might have been on the pages.

"What were you doing?" Tim asks his dad. his tone bordering on hysterical rage. "What did you think you were going to do?"

He never gets an answer in the dream. He knows it's because his conscious mind can't answer the question enough to give his unconscious mind a break.

"Tim." It's not his dad's voice. Not Stephanie's. It's out of place in his house. "Tim, wake up!" 

He turns his gaze to his father. The man's eyes shoot open and his hand grabs Tim by the shoulder. 

He screams, bolting upward and colliding with something large and solid. He hears a grunt of pain before the vision of his bedroom swims back into focus. His real bedroom, in his apartment. 

"Ow," Kon mutters, holding a hand protectively over his nose. It's not bleeding, so Tim doesn't think he's done much damage. Good. Both for Kon and for the fact he can't stand seeing blood just yet. "Are you awake now?"

"Yeah." Tim grimaces as he moves. He's coated in sweat and it's gone cold. He sits up, reaching to turn on the bedside lamp. His partner is seated on the edge of the bed, feeling along his cheekbones. Tim's hand kind of hurts so maybe he did hit him that hard. "Sorry. Did I wake you up?"

Kon scrunches his face up and seems to decide that nothing is broken. "No. I just came in to check on you and you were...thrashing I guess? You didn't yell until I tried waking you up." 

Tim tries to calm his racing heart. He lets the last of the dream slip from his mind. That's learned behavior too; he used to obsess over it while analyzing every detail. Now he can store them away, push them back for when he's more emotionally able to deal with them which is not all that often. He draws his knees up, pressing his face against his thighs until things settle in his mind. "You checked on me?" He questions, letting that sink in. "Why?"

He can feel Kon shift uneasily. "I woke up and just had a feeling and Roy Harper told me to keep an eye on you tonight." 

That makes Tim look up, eyes narrowed. He feels like he's being watched, somehow, even if he knows Roy's abilities aren't a psychic viewing window into this current moment of his life. "I'm fine," he mutters. "It was just a dream." 

"Looked like more than that," Kon says mildly. "Do you want anything? Some water?" He looks helpless. He probably feels helpless, Tim realizes. Roy warned him to keep an eye on him and for what? It's not something he can fight. It's not even something he can comfort him over. Not unless he lets him in.

Tim has to make a decision. And he chooses, reluctantly, to open up. "It was about my dad," he admits, shifting to kick the covers off his legs. "The night he died." 

"Oh." That's it. But Kon's face reads sympathy. His posture reads how sorry he is, for the loss and for how he's in his partner's space right now. Tim's reminded that Kon's parents are dead too, though he was too young to remember anything about them.

"I need to change," Tim says and Kon is moving, finding him some new pajamas easily enough. He hands him cooler, light-weight pajamas, apparently noticing his are soaked through with sweat. He turns his back while Tim changes, even though there's hardly any requirement of modesty between them. "Thanks," he says when he's done. He curls up again, squinting at the clock after a moment. "It's early." He's been asleep for five hours. That's impressive for him. 

Kon shifts himself onto the bed again. "Yeah," he agrees. "But don't think about getting up."

"I'm not going to be able to go back to sleep." The dream has set off a lot of memories, obviously. A lot of longings that strike him often enough in the pre-dawn hours. He misses his parents. He misses Steph. "It gets too quiet. Too alone in my head." 

That's when Kon reaches over and turns off the lamp. Tim blinks rapidly, waiting for his eyes to adjust to the dimness. The bed tips slightly on the other side and is that...? No. Kon can't be getting into bed with him. But he is. He feels his partner slide under the covers and he reaches out, gently placing a hand on Tim's shoulder to draw him down. 

Tim is...remarkably still tired and emotionally drained out. He feels like he's gotten no sleep at all. He eases himself back to the bed, shifting until he's comfortable. Kon's hand remains on his arm, solid and warm and grounding. This is no dream. This is reality. He can't change what's happened. He can only make choices moving forward.

He makes a mental note to get in contact with Stephanie tomorrow. He promises himself he'll visit his parents' graves before he leaves Gotham. He knows, as always, that he should put the summoning circle out of his mind. He'd broken it by knocking over the water. He'd made whatever creature his father brought forth disappear again, before it could get his father's soul if not before it took his life. 

It hadn't been his mother. Never before had he been so relieved to have her dead when he realized years later that could have happened and all his father could have done without realizing it. He's been advised to push it from his thoughts. He's been told by supernatural experts and therapists alike that delving deeper will only upset him. He'll never have answers about what his father intended, or what really happened. It was ruled a suicide. 

"Stop," Kon says in the dark, nudging him and digging fingers against his ribs. "I can hear you thinking from over here. Quit it." 

"I can't stop thinking," Tim protests. Was his bed always this warm? It's almost soothing. It's Kon, he decides after a moment. It's his presence and his body heat. 

The hand slides from his arm to his shoulder, rubbing at a knot there. It's a knot Tim is pretty sure exists eternally and Kon knows right where to find it. "Then adjust your thoughts. Not to the dream. Not to the case. Think about...I don't know. Think about all the waffles you want to try." 

It's stupid. But maybe it will help. Better than counting sheep. "Apple. Chocolate chip. Caramel apple. Blueberry pie." 

"Shh," Kon urges with a yawn of his own. "Think. To yourself. Not talk." 

Tim wonders what the science behind naming waffles is and if it's similar to counting sheep, but he certainly has a lot to choose from. He even comes up with a few combinations he'd like to try to create himself. Probably with help. He's not great with the waffle maker. He swears it went into mourning when Stephanie left. 

He falls asleep again to the sound of Kon's steady breathing, reassuring in the dark of his bedroom. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Reviews/Comments always read and appreciated. ♥ Prompts, requests, and whatnot related to this fic or others can be directed below or 


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> More investigation! More progress on the case! More Jason! All wrapped up in a decently sized chapter this time. To answer someone's random question, yes this fic is done and is just being posted on a weekly or bi-weekly basis. I hope everyone had a good Halloween!

Morning finds Tim abandoning Kon in his bed to go in search of coffee. It's only a bit jarring to wake up in bed with someone else. The early light brings a flood of last night's memories with it and he cringes a little at how weak he must seem. He doesn't talk about his parents, or about his past, all that much. He sticks to largely mundane topics with his coworkers to at least try to blend in with them, though usually it results in them wondering how someone so weird grew up in such an average household. It's not like he hides what happened to his parents even if anyone with any type of internet search skills can find the out the truth. His mother's poisoning and his father's supposed suicide are public record, after all. He's a bit surprised sometime that no one had ever thought to suggest he killed his parents when they were suggesting he killed Stephanie.

He sets his coffee to brew, scowling at nothing (except the indignity of being awake) as per his usual morning routine. He's barely pouring the first cup when he hears the shower start up. Kon gives him his space before he's properly caffeinated and Tim definitely appreciates that even if he's worried sometimes that his partner will lose some of his goodness just by contact. He likes to joke there's a cloud hanging over his life but the thought of anyone being injured or dying because of him is too much to stand. 

Coffee chases those bad thoughts away. Tim has a third mug poured for himself and one set aside for Kon by the time the man emerges from the shower. Morning routines are also familiar to both of them; perhaps they do spend too much time together. 

“About last night.” Tim isn't one to dwell on things, but he's not one to dance around important subjects either. 

“It's no problem,” Kon replies almost instantly. “You'd do the same for me.”

It's kind of annoying when the man reads his mind. “I was going to say you snore.” 

“You'd be a liar, then,” he answers back easily. Damn the man and his ability to function without caffeine first thing in the morning. Tim hates morning people. 

He hesitates at what he says next. They're still going to be stuck together for a few more weeks and Kon deserves the truth over that alone. Kon won't be able to transfer mid-assignment and Tim doesn't want to make the last days of their partnership terribly awkward. Which, he's pretty sure these will be the last days if he opens his mouth. But the risk is worth it. Kon's safety is worth it. “My dad didn't really kill himself. At least I don't think he did.” 

The look on Kon's face shows him that he had indeed known how his father supposedly died. Tim's probably mentioned it himself, though he's woven it into his narrative as much as anything else that he tries to treat casually. “Oh Tim...” 

“Don't,” Tim spits out. He hates that tone. That sympathetic tone, the one that means he's clearly grief stricken and crazy. It felt like every decision he made after his dad's death, someone had tried to use that tone on him. “Just listen to me, Kon.” 

To his credit, Kon does. He frowns, but he goes quiet. 

“There was a circle on the floor. Police didn't know what it was and I didn't either. Not for years, which is why I haven't brought it up. But it was a summoning circle. He had all the tools to do a basic summoning but I don't think he knew what he was going to call. He wanted to talk to my mom. But it wasn't her.” Even now, saying it out loud, he doubts himself. Doubts the face and claws in the orange light. Thinks that maybe he did have a mental breakdown that night and Stephanie was the only thing that kept him from tumbling over the edge after his father. “I still don't know what it was but I think it made him do what he did. I think it wanted blood and he couldn't pull away. He opened himself to it and...things ended. That way.” 

For as much of a disbeliever as Kon is, he doesn't laugh at him. He doesn't even roll his eyes or shake his head or offer that ' _Tim is chasing a supernatural tale_ ' look. “Have you talked to anyone about this?” He asks simply. 

Tim almost burns his mouth on his coffee. He doesn't care. “Like a psychiatrist or like a demon summoner?”

“Either,” Kon says. “Both.” 

“Psychiatrist thinks I tried to bundle my father's personal demons into an outside manifestation but also that I'm quite poetic at describing it. Demon summoners are harder to come by but a witch I talked to reassured me that while I didn't save my father's life, he's not damned for all eternity. He's actually with my mother.” Kon can probably guess which one he'd taken more comfort in. “I won't say this is where my penchant for supernatural things came from, but learning the truth about what happened helped me on my way.” 

This is it. This is the part where Kon tells him he's crazy. Where he suggests he get some real help and storms off. But he only opens the refrigerator, hunting through it for some milk to pour into his coffee. “Thanks for telling me,” he says softly. “I appreciate that you trust me enough to do so.” He goes for the sugar canister, casting him a hesitant smile. “We going to the New Old Archives today?”

Tim is still staring. Kon's just...accepted it. He's just told him his father was killed by a demon and his partner hasn't really helped him confirm it but he hasn't immediately told Tim he's crazy either. Maybe he's waiting to call Director Lance until later? Maybe he's being polite?

“New Old. Because they are old files in a new building. Remember?” Kon huffs. “Come on. It wasn't that bad of a joke. Yours are way worse.” 

Apparently, this really isn't going to become a thing. Kon's not blowing him off. At least not to his face. Tim feels a kind of painful, but good constriction in his chest, like when he sees a really nice computer or a really cute puppy. “Yeah,” He says, trying to keep the excited grin off his face. “That's where we're going.” 

“Great. Maybe put on some pants that have a button and a zipper,” the larger man suggests. He's already dressed for the day and Tim...well he' is aware he looks like he just crawled out of bed. He can't even pass for bedhead; it looks like a monsoon went over his head and clothes. 

“Right,” He agrees. He chugs the rest of his coffee and he hears Kon snort as he disappears back into his bedroom. Gel in the hair. A quick run through with the blow dryer so it doesn't look crusted to his head. Olive green pants that aren't super wrinkled (he can't stand to wear jeans today after the nightmare) and a t-shirt that looks okay with a coat thrown over it. Good enough; he's not out to impress anyone anyway. 

By the time he's ready to leave, Kon has packed a thermos of coffee and he has a list of donut places on the way. He's a good partner. 

~*~*~

It takes Kon to charm the head archivist in order to get access to the old archives. She warns them over and over that the documents are delicate and the filing system is precise and they must leave everything how they found it. As Tim surveys the piles of boxes with things like “Miscellaneous War???” written on them, he kind of doubts her filing system. 

More recent things are easier to find and, fortunately, fifty years ago still counts as recent in the grand scheme of things. Files are organized chronologically and by type. Kon goes for newspaper articles and Tim starts with police records. The table they set up shop on is dusty and the lamps barely glow but he thought ahead to bring his own reading lantern. Kon is envious if the dirty looks thrown his way are anything to go by. 

“There's not much more here than was in the file,” he says when he's finished sorting through his stacks. “The article about her wedding ran again in reprint after her murder. That's kind of macabre.” 

“Very.” Tim has been moderately more successful by finding detailed photos of the murder scene and transcribed interviews with the witnesses. There's even few pages of hand-written notes detailing potential suspects. Tim's stomach turns as he sees notes on Abigail's father, even if he had been cleared quickly from suspicion. He knows what it's like to live with that over your head. He's sure Bruce Wayne does too, actually. People hadn't been able to fathom how he could love two adopted sons and not bother to have any children of his own. Until recently, that was. 

“The people the police investigated were all dead ends,” Tim announces. “Her parents made inquiries every time they could and those kept the case active for longer, but it still went cold. They ultimately decided it was probably a transient individual who killed her and left the area. Her father never believed it. He was convinced until he died that it was someone trying to hurt him and they succeeded.” 

Kon shakes his head, his gaze on the newspaper articles. The paper has been preserved, but it's still brittle and he's careful with his touch. “It sucks,” he says at last. “It sucks that we can't save her. That we can't go back and save any of them.” 

“Just Jason.” But Tim agrees wholeheartedly. He's heard from those working cold case that the only thing they can offer the victims is justice. He keeps reminding himself of that. “I just wish I knew what the binding element was. If we know why he goes after certain people then we can stop him.” 

“If it's a demon,” Kon adds. “If he's actually as old as he should be for these killings I'm pretty sure a high step or a slick bathtub will stop him.” 

Tim's mouth twitches despite himself. Gallows humor. It's how they get by. As he reads he feels more and more that Jason's story is Abigail's. Only Jason lived, and she did not. Different ages, different sexes, different appearances. The cases shouldn't ring so true to one another but it seems nearly every mark left on Abigail is one that was reported to have been left on Jason.

They gather what details they can. “One of the kids with Abigail described a man with a green tinge to his hair. His teeth were jagged, like they'd been broken out. He smelled like a slaughterhouse.” Tim's reminded of Florence and her story about a man whose breath smelled like pennies. Blood. 

“The articles stop five years after her death,” Kon replies. “Her parents say they'll never give up. Her dad is quoted as saying nothing will stop his suffering except finding out who did this to her.” 

Five years is long enough for the world to move on but still never long enough for a parent. He passes Kon the rest of the police report. Two sets of eyes are better than one and he doesn't want to miss anything. The archivist has made no secret what she thinks of making copies or allowing them to take any material at all out of this room. 

They work for a couple of hours in near silence. They both make notes and Tim finds himself staring intently at a picture of a woman who died even before his parents were born. It's her engagement portrait, he knows, and she looks so young. So bright. Like there's so much life ahead of her. It's the same sensation he'd had when he stared at Jason's school photo. 

He has to put a stop to this. 

The records of all the other victims are contained in a different archive. Tim uses the opportunity of the files contained in this one to look up the remaining orphan from the same time period. He simply disappears from records. Tim hopes he got adopted and nothing more sinister happened to him.

There is a note at the last of the police report. A psychic had visited and warned of more victims and a great evil. She'd told them where to find the monster. They'd laughed her off. There's nothing remaining of more information about her; not even her name.

They leave with far more details than they arrived with, but absolutely nothing helpful. It's frustrating but kind of what Tim expected. 

~*~*~

Tim has a massive headache as he types out an email to their reference librarian. The pain is behind one eye and spreading fast, threatening to consume his whole head. He tells the librarian what information he wants and where to send it to. They can find true crime information in Gotham; he's looking for the supernatural. He wants anything about the Jester or Trickster or Joker., how to keep people safe from him, and how to banish him.

Kon drives to the New Archive without being asked. A cop is manning the desk here instead of a librarian. It's a rookie who is all too eager to show the two FBI agents to the cold case files. Apparently he hasn't been initiated into the rivalry between local cops and government officials yet. It probably helps that Tim avidly listens when he talks about the strange happenings in the building and how he thinks it might be haunted. 

It's a welcome distraction in comparison to the darker forces that exist. Papers being misfiled and the electricity being turned on and off are easily explained. A poltergeist is light-hearted by comparison to wading through decades of death and misery and trying to find the one clue that everyone else overlooked. 

Kon is better at that with more modern cases. He reviews them and passes them to Tim, who tries to hunt out any damning evidence. There are defensive wounds on one victim. Four of them had crosses that burned into their flesh. That hardly seems a help as protection against evil; more a hazard to the wearer. Tim can feel his mind starting to go numb, starting to exist only in survival mode like it used to when he was studying for particularly boring exams. 

He blesses the powers that be (and Director Lance's budget) for his tablet when he gets an email containing the information he's asked for since none of it is confidential enough to bother with faxing. It's a start to the information, at least. He's eager to open it up but becomes less so when he sees the skeptical look Kon casts him as he continues to work on real, tangible things instead of chasing down ghosts. Or demons in this case. 

The first few documents are generic. Good spirits feed on good emotions. Bad spirits feed on negative feelings and sensations. Demons have been documented since the beginning of human history. It's all stuff he knows. It's stuff that can be gathered from any mediocre History Channel documentary. Then he gets the more detailed documents. 

Some variation on the Trickster has been around since the Middle Ages. It started as a demon said to play mean-spirited tricks to get a laugh but the creature slowly evolved. Suddenly the pranks were no longer harmless. The jokes it made were grotesque and horrifying. It developed a taste for human suffering at that point and evolved into the Jester. Rumors of maimings and maulings appeared, none substantiated. Records of priests and occultists trying to banish him had been recovered even if they had no success. 

At least until Samuel Bryant. A miller, having watched his wife and child burn alive after one of the Jester's antics decided to put a stop to it. The information is in narrative form, like a folk story, and Tim finds himself staring at the page, willing more to manifest. How did he do it? How did he find the knowledge to do it?

“Tim?” Kon asks. He jumps, biting his lip to keep from screaming. He drops the tablet instead, scrambling to pick it up. His partner just shakes his head at him. “I asked if you were hungry.” 

_Hungry for knowledge_ , his brain supplies and the joke is dumb even to his subconscious. “Ah. No. Not yet.” What time is it? He blinks, realizing that it's already late afternoon. He's been sucked into reading so much he's entirely lost track. Kon looks a little worn out, rubbing his eyes. “I have things to analyze,” he explains. 

“Noticed.” Kon counters. “Ready to go?” With a pointed glance at the stack of files in front of Tim that he hasn't bothered to look at since he first got the documents in his email. 

“Yeah. Sorry.” He's left Kon to handle the lion's share of that work. He's going to have to make it up to him somehow. “Why don't we stop for lunch? My treat?”

Kon looks skeptical. “What horrible thing are you going to ask me to do if I accept this lunch?” And Tim winces a little because, most of the time, his partner would be right on the money. 

“Nothing this time. I swear,” Tim replies earnestly. “I really am sorry. I just made a breakthrough in this and I couldn't stop. My brain needed to switch gears.” 

“Uhuh,” Kon drawls. “I'm still going to take you up on lunch though because I'm starving. I'll fill you in outside and if it seems like you're not listening, there will be a test.”

It's better than Tim deserves. 

~*~*~

Kon fills him in as they walk the streets of Gotham, taking advantage of the uncharacteristically good weather and sunshine. He'd been accurate in thinking there was nothing new in the police files for the victims. They'd only recently become linked after all. There are no leads and no suspects, only a lot of parents pushing for answers. 

Tim's chewing that thought over as Kon finally veers them toward a little shop. Tim's hopeful it's pizza before he steps inside and realizes everyone has a hot dog of some kind. Even Jason Wayne, sitting at a booth with a hulking security guard, an older man, and a chili dog. 

“You have great taste,” Jason comments as they walk past. 

Tim points a thumb at his companion. “He picked it.”

Kon indicates his phone like he can somehow blame it for them running into Jason here. “Great reviews.” 

“Yeah most of those are probably me.” Jason pauses as the older man with him clears his throat. “Uh. This is Alfred. The monkey in the suit is named Mikey.” 

“Michael,” He amends. “My name is Michael.” 

Jason ignores him, but Alfred stands up, extending his hand. Kon shakes it first, then Tim. “How lovely to meet the both of you,” Alfred comments. “Agents Drake and Kent? You gave Master Bruce quite the shaking up.” 

He doesn't seem all that upset by it, so that's a good sign. Tim grins a little. “I'm sure he's only looking after Jason here.” With a glance at Michael, who is studiously reading his phone, eating his hot dog, and ignoring them.

“Well I wish he would stop,” Jason grumbles. “It's getting to be a little suffocating.” 

Alfred sits back down and resumes cutting his fries with a knife and fork. It's kind of fascinating to watch and Tim feels hideously uncultured. “As difficult as it can be with Master Bruce, it is good he has a view of the outside world at times,” he agrees. “Would the two of you care to join us?”

Tim is as subtle as he can be glancing over to Kon for permission to accept, but the man, surprisingly, is already nodding. “Just let us place our order.”

Kon knows what he wants since he'd read the menu earlier. Tim scans over the options and almost grimaces because there's nothing he can eat here and look cool. He's going to make a disaster of his face and clothes with any of the options. Maybe he can use a fork? Do they have forks here or did Alfred bring his own? “You going to interrogate them over lunch?” Kon murmurs as they browse. 

“Only a little,” Tim admits, cursing the fact his friend does know him so well. “You think there's anything to be gained?”

Kon shrugs. Tim translates it as that it can't hurt to find out. They make their respective orders and their meals are on the counter before they are done paying. It's enough to pick them up and slide into chairs at the occupied table. 

For a moment, it's quiet. Kon takes a bite of his food and groans a little. “These are super good.” He tells Jason. “Well worth writing counterfeit reviews over.” 

“I sometimes think I should tank the rating so this place becomes my personal secret,” Jason admits with a shrug. “But I don't want to go too far and drive them out of business.”

Jason and Kon easily get wrapped up in their conversation about food and Tim glances to Alfred. It's time to hone interrogation techniques. “Babysitting duty or here by choice?”

“I assure you I am quite a willing captive,” Alfred replies. “Master Jason needed some fresh air and I needed to do a bit of shopping so our schedules synced up perfectly.”

He somehow doubts that's exactly the case but Jason seems happy enough to have the man's company and it's another pair of eyes on him, so that's good enough for Tim. “His dad must be really worried about him.” It's a fairly innocuous statement. “Or has this just been a thing since after we got to town?”

“He shows concern for all his children,” Alfred replies. Tim tries to copy his elegant motions of spearing fries with a fork. The hot dog definitely has to be eaten by hand. It will just be faster that way and Tim can rush through it instead of chasing it around with a fork. “Perhaps a wayward sheep needs a bit more care than the rest of the flock, however.” 

Jason pauses long enough in his conversation with Kon to glance over. “Baa.” He goes immediately back to talking about putting cheddar cheese on apple pie. Weirdos. 

Tim pushes on. “I know it's difficult letting go. When something bad happens to you, in childhood especially, you kind of just think those things will keep happening. I know it happened to me.” He's trying to approach it from a human angle to fish for information. Bruce wants him kept at a distance for a reason, right? He needs to know why. He's willing to humanize himself and lie a little more to make it happen. And Kon says he has the social skills of a terrier. 

The look Alfred gives him suggests the man doesn't buy his act -not for a moment. “Master Bruce has dealt quite well with his personal demons.” It's a very diplomatic answer, Tim thinks. Not disputing that there were issues to overcome but also not allowing much of a follow up without feeling like a total jerk. Tim doesn't want Alfred to think he's a jerk.

“You're on!” Kon yells, and Tim grimaces as fries almost escape out of his mouth. He pauses to swallow, washing it down with a huge gulp of soda. “Jason thinks he can beat me at pin ball!” He announces, gesturing to the couple of machines on the far wall. 

“Oh God,” Tim groans. His gaze drifts to Jason. “Why did you do this?”

“What?” Jason asks innocently except he is not innocent. Not at all. He knows damn well what he did. 

Kon is already wolfing down his food like he won't be allowed to go play until he does. “He gets really competitive,” Tim hisses because his partner, win or lose, probably isn't going to shut up about this for a month or more. 

“Because I'm great!” He declares. “Let's go.” He shoves his chair back and Tim is kind of impressed that the hot dog has basically disappeared, devoured. Kon might return for his fries but for the moment he's dashing toward the pinball machine like a little kid set free. It appears to be themed like the Addams Family so at least this place has good taste along in décor along with the good food. 

They race to be able to play first turn and Michael trails behind them after a moment, apparently remembering he's supposed to be doing some body guarding. Alfred's gaze is fond and gentle. He's not only a butler, Tim decides. He raised Bruce and it would seem he's raised Bruce's children as well. It makes his estimation of the Wayne family go up. 

But he also can't pass up this opportunity. “It must have been great to have Jason back after what happened.” 

There's a tenseness in the man across from him that allows Tim to know he's hit a nerve. Perhaps more of one than he hit with Bruce. Alfred loved Jason as well, didn't he? “It came as quite the shock but one most welcome,” Alfred replies. “I do wish if you had questions, Agent Drake, that you would simply ask them. None of this will qualify as pleasant lunch conversation.” 

Called out. Tim grimaces a little and tries to remind himself he's only doing his job. Right? “Sorry. I'm just trying to keep Jason safe and I feel like Mr. Wayne isn't being entirely honest about what happened. Jason doesn't remember enough to tell me-” 

“For the better,” Alfred interrupts. But he doesn't look angry and that's a bonus. “I encourage Master Bruce toward honesty to you and your partner, if not to the police. I admit that has become difficult for him with regard to his children but if there were a reason to suspect Master Jason might be in any known danger I would alert you.” 

At least Jason has someone with a level head looking out for him in that house. Tim is still a little puzzled over family dynamics but what does he have to base the idea of family relationships on? Not a lot. He's an only child and his mother was dead before he reached adulthood. “I hope you would,” Tim agrees. “Because I just want to help. It's not always flesh and blood dangers. There are other things. Things a bodyguard might not protect against.” 

Alfred's smile is wry before he dabs his mouth with a napkin. “I am well aware of the things out there in the dark. Master Bruce and I see the children well protected against those as well. Master Jason was a learning experience that never should have occurred.” 

So cleanly put. So well put. Isn't only one of Bruce's children still an actual child? Still, something about Alfred's manner eases his concerns a little. He'd want this man watching his back. 

“Motherfucker!” Jason yells and Alfred sighs. Tim wouldn't be a bit surprised if the old butler pulls soap out of his pocket and washes his charge's mouth out with it. “You're cheating!” 

“How can I cheat?” Kon shoots back. “How is it even possible for me to cheat at this?”

Tim echoes the sigh. “Good sportsmanship my ass. He lords his trophies over me and he's the worst when he wins. Or when he loses.” 

“I would hate to see Jason hurt,” Alfred says and for a moment Tim wonders if he thinks Kon has a habit of coming to blows over pinball games. “His life has not been the easiest of matters. If I can prevent any hardships from befalling him, I would like to do so. He, at least, believes you're out to do him no harm. Is that accurate?”

“Of course!” Tim speaks with conviction. “I wouldn't do anything to hurt him. Not on purpose.” 

Alfred looks him over. The man's gaze is heavy and appraising. Tim feels intensely judged and also hopeful that he passes muster. He must, because Alfred folds his napkin and places it in the plastic basket his food arrived in. “I am quite glad to hear it, Agent Drake.” 

Tim nods. “Kon, come over and finish your food,” He calls to him when the pinball machine does something that he assumes means the end of the game. Kon is grinning so comes willingly enough, Jason glowering behind him. 

But it seems like Jason has found something else to win at, because he takes the seat next to Tim instead of the one across the table. That might not be so unusual, except for the fact his arm drapes around Tim's shoulders. Tim freezes; the touch isn't exactly unwelcome, but it's sudden. Kon's eyes go hard, and he's watching them like a hawk, so Tim tries to force himself to relax. 

“You like bars?” Jason asks. Tim blinks. 

“As well as anyone else?” He replies like he's unsure of the answer and Kon snorts because he's dragged his drunk ass out of more than a few bars or heard him complaining about the ones he hates. 

“I was going to check out one of my favorites tonight. They've recently swapped up the menu. Would you want to come with me? Maybe eight thirty?”

Tim doesn't know what to say. He's faintly aware of Kon bristling and Alfred's faintly disapproving look. But this is a chance to get to the bottom of things, isn't it? And some time with Jason Wayne..well he wants that a little more than he cares to admit, even with Kon sitting right there across from them glaring at him. 

“Sure,” he says.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments/Reviews/Wild theories always read and appreciated <3 Also I love getting prompts for inspiration. Got any of those? Drop it here or [right here](http://strikeyourcolors.tumblr.com/ask) and I'll take a look.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There is smut in this chapter that actually gives the fic its rating. Stop reading at "You said something about a back room?" if you want to skip the smut and start reading...uh I guess just the last sentence of this chapter ♥

Kon hadn't been particularly thrilled with Tim's plan and no amount of pointing out how useful it would be to have Jason alone does any good. “There's someone out there killing people,” Kon reminds him for the fourth time (Tim's been counting) and crosses his arms over his broad chest. “Brutally killing, I might add. Not even just like a bullet to the brain.” 

“Because you'd rather me get shot in the head than have a chance at escape,” Tim replies and knows it's a little spiteful. “Got it.” He glares harder when Kon rolls his eyes. “Keep doing that and your face will get stuck that way.” 

“You made the rules,” His partner reminds him. “No going out alone for long periods, especially at night. I could come with you and Jason wouldn't even have to know I was there but I can keep an eye on you both.” 

Kon's argument comes from a place of love. Tim knows that and it makes it all the more difficult to argue against. He cares about him and his feelings and knows it is reciprocated. “I'll be careful but I really think this could help us in the case.” 

“Bullshit,” The other man replies. “This isn't about the case, Tim. This is about Jason Wayne and you wanting to see him all alone. It's gotten personal for you and it's never supposed to get personal. You know better than this.” 

Tim bites the inside of his cheek so hard he tastes blood. He's used to Kon's caution and protective streak. He's not used to the almost accusatory behavior. “I'm not a child, Conner. I'm going to do it.” 

The silence as he packs up his things almost hurts him. He can tell his partner is gritting his teeth to avoid saying anything worse. “Don't wait up,” Tim offers at last. “We'll go out for dinner and play some video games when this is over, alright?”

Kon throws the car keys in his general direction but doesn't say a word. 

Tim thinks maybe he's going to have a problem. Spending time with Kon and now with Jason is...nice. Too nice. The other shoe has to drop sometime because it always does when he gets attached to someone. 

The bar he meets Jason at is relatively upscale. It's cozy and relaxing, with wood paneling everywhere and a crowd that Tim gathers are mostly hedonistic judging by what he sees taking place. Even the debauchery feels kind of classy, given the relaxed atmosphere. 

Jason is indeed alone. Apparently Michael's still on shift but he'd been only too happy to go get a beer somewhere else and meet his charge later. Tim thinks that's pretty sloppy for someone who is entrusted with Jason's life, but it's not his place to interfere. At least not at the moment. 

They sit next to each other on a leather sofa tucked back into one of the smaller, quieter rooms. They talk about Tim's work and about Jason's. They get appetizers and drinks and everything is ridiculously delicious. Tim's feeling more relaxed than he has in a week. In _months_ probably. The fact that Jason's company is never awkward is...it's kind of new for him, actually. He's never met someone he's clicked with so well outside of Kon. 

"I don't have a drug problem though I know that rumor circulate," Jason tells him with that little half smirk that Tim's grasped means he's trying to act comfortable talking about a very uncomfortable topic. Tim admires him for his ability to plow through even if he regrets the reasons Jason must have had to learn to do so. "My mom was an addict. I learned early on that it wasn't what I wanted. The first year or so after Bruce brought me home? It was a nightmare. Pills and injections. Sedatives. Tranquilizers. It made everything so much worse."

It's intensely personal and a battle Tim knows entirely too well. When you're reacting differently to something than everyone else says you should. It's a difficult situation to be in. "You don't have to tell me any of this." He remembers Kon saying similar things to him, when he tried to talk about his dad. But Tim had wanted to then, and it appears Jason wants to now. 

"If I thought I had to I wouldn't do it," the other man retorts. "You're...different somehow. It's different with you." And Tim can't stop the butterflies in his stomach no badly how much he wants to. Jason just has that effect on him. "I know you won't sell my story to tabloids. I know you won't even go to anyone except that partner of yours and marvel over how fucked up I am. It's kind of liberating, talking to someone with zero motivation to do you harm and absolutely no social connections."

Tim snorts. "Gee, thanks." He can't argue with the assessment, though. 

Jason's smirk turns into a brief grin. "Better than that, you're actively trying to save my life. From a demon. A demon you have no experience dealing with but are still going to try to go toe to toe with for little old me. You're quite the FBI agent." 

"Pretty sure most of the higher ups want to fire me for thinking this was a demon in the first place," Tim replies. "As though dragging in a guy who would have to be like a hundred years old by now would make things any better." 

"It does," Jason answers. Tim's eyes narrow a little at him, instantly suspicious. But he elaborates. "When it's a person, they have a face and a name. A history they can analyze as to why he did horrible things to good people and they can blame it all on society or his mommy issues or violent video games or whatever. When it's a demon? Or when it's something they can't explain? They can't do any of that. They have to accept that sometimes shit things happen to really good or innocent people and that's just the universe in motion. It's no one's fault." 

He knows all too well the need to place blame and make sense of horrible things that happen in your life. Tim even wondered himself, in the early days, if he hadn't just dreamed up a demon because he couldn't handle his father being miserable enough to commit suicide. "That's very soulful." 

A shrug is his answer at first. It's probably a gesture developed when Jason was younger and smaller because it seems like barely a muscle twitch in those hulking shoulders. "I'm not good or innocent but I read a lot. I did then, too. When it happened." 

"You were a kid." And Tim's firm in that. He knows Jason had a record when Bruce adopted him, even if he got it expunged. He was also a pretty infamous brawler at the prep school Tim wasn't quite elite enough to get into until Jason was already gone. 

The other man snorts. "You know how I got caught? I remembered it pretty early on. Most of it's a blur but, clear as day, I know why I left the house that night." 

Criminal mischief, people had speculated. Maybe Jason Wayne was meeting a lover his father didn't approve of. Maybe he was going to do drugs, or vandalize something, or return to the trash he'd come from. Neither Bruce nor Alfred had known why, late in the night, Jason had disappeared from the grounds of Wayne Manor never to be seen again. Now Tim is about to find out and he can do nothing but watch him with wide eyes. 

"I just got an A in Trigonometry. How I managed that I'll never have any idea. I've always sucked at math in general." He stares at his glass. The amber liquid in the bottom shimmers as he turns it back and forth. "Bruce was out that night but he left me an envelope. He gave me twenty bucks and wrote a note that said he was proud of me." Jason knocks back the drink, his eyes connecting with Tim's somberly. "He signed it with 'Dad'. Not Bruce. Just 'I'm proud of you. Dad.' and I couldn't take it."

Tim's heart feels like it's being squeezed in his chest. "What?" He breathes. 

"I couldn't take having him be proud of me or having him be my dad. I didn't deserve a dad like him. I deserved the human garbage that had died in prison, not Bruce fucking Wayne." Tim wants to reassure Jason. He wants to _hug_ him which is bizarre in and of itself because he rarely wants to hug anyone. "I just wanted out for a few hours. I needed to clear my head without him surrounding me, take a walk without having to ask for permission. I was going to be back before daylight when they'd miss me." 

His voice is bitter and hurt and Tim hurts _for_ him. For all his own father's failings that he's begun to recognize as he got older, he'd never doubted that the man loved him or that he wanted what was best for him. How would it have been suddenly gaining that all in his teenage years from someone asking nothing in return?

Jason laughs without humor and shakes his head. "We see how that turned out. Years of my life gone. Years of Bruce's and Alfie's and even Dickface's lives fucked up because of me. Because I couldn't stand seeing three letters on a fucking ripped piece of stationary."

They sit in silence for a moment. Jason orders another drink. Tim tries to swallow enough of his to catch up. "It wasn't your fault," he says at last, very quietly. "I'm sure you've been told that like a million times by now. But it really wasn't."

Jason's fingers are a little shaky as he accepts the drink from the waiter (who is ever so prompt, waiting on a Wayne heir as he is) but he still manages to tip him. His eyes are watery when he looks at Tim again but he's pretty sure that's more the alcohol than the emotion. "I have," he confirms. "By people who have never screwed up that badly."

"What about from me? Was it my fault that I was on a date the night my dad died? My mom drank from a cup that was supposed to be mine and it killed her.” He says it before he thinks of it, hesitating a moment before deciding it's not something he can simply sweep under the rug. “I wanted her to trade cups with me because she had a flavor of drink that I liked more. It was an accident. A stupid accident that someone garnished the drink I had with a poisonous plant and it dissolved into it.” 

He has to shake off the memory. “I get it, Jason, I really really do because I would do anything to change my actions because one simple thing might have kept either of them alive." He's surprised at the fierceness in his own tone. At the conviction he speaks them with because however logically he knows these events weren't caused by his choices, he still could have changed them with a different one. 

"Hindsight sure is a bitch," Jason agrees.

"I think the expression is 20/20." But Tim can definitely see Jason's point of view. He sulks into his drink, still a bit startled at how open he's being with this man.

But the older man bumps his shoulder lightly into Tim's. It's such a Kon-like gesture that it startles him for a moment. "So who were you on a date with?" Jason asks and he's definitely, definitely about to say something horrible because he has a totally wicked gleam in his eyes. "The girl you were engaged to or the guy you offed her for?"

Even though he's heard it before, Tim is still shocked. It's something whispered about. He's never confronted with it. Is Jason serious suggesting he...but no. Jason is grinning like he thinks it's a joke because he _knows_ it's not true. No questioning about it is necessary. Never has Tim been so complimented to be thought of as simply not a murderer. "Did I just blow your mind?" Jason questions. "Like you blew that-" 

Tim laughs. It's nearly hysterical, shocked as it is. He can hear Jason's chuckles start too and he can't even finish what lewd thing he was about to say. He covers his mouth, trying to muffle the howls of laughter that threaten to escape. His belly aches. The alcohol burns halfway back up his throat. He laughs until his eyes stream and he feels like he can't breathe, totally out of control. Jason is right there with him, a hand rubbing his back when it seems like Tim might choke. They're pressed together on the sofa now, and they might as well be the only two people in the place for how much Tim cares about anyone else.

"Seriously, though," Jason says when Tim recovers enough to look at him. "Are you into guys? Because if I'm reading this wrong..." He leans forward and kisses him. Tim panics at first, brain short circuiting as he tries to remember how to kiss. With tongues? Jason's not using his tongue. It's kind of dry and almost chaste and of course it will stay that way because Tim's eyes are still streaming tears and he's pretty sure his nose is leaking snot. 

He enjoys the kiss anyway. It's a kiss from a guy he's kind of liked his whole life who was dead then not and who is currently being stalked by a serial killing demon. It makes Tim start to giggle again because what is his life? What choices made him punish himself this way?

"Not the best reaction to a kiss," Jason murmurs as he pulls back. His expression is open, but cautious. He's been hurt before, Tim thinks, especially like this. 

Usually he doesn't have to apologize immediately after a kiss. "I'm sorry. That was more a reflection on my ineptitude than you or your kissing skills." He wipes his face on his sleeve which is maybe not the most attractive thing to do but Jason doesn't seem to mind since he kisses him again. It's better this time; less tentative and with no laughter. Jason's arm twines around his waist and pulls him closer. Tim braces himself with his fingers on one muscular thigh.

"My place?" Jason asks when the kiss ends. "Yours? Maybe a back room? Am I being too forward?"

"Not mine and no? I don't think too forward?" Tim wishes his brain and his mouth would reconnect already. There are a million thoughts swirling through his head and he can't edit them to say what he needs to. They barely know each other. They have bigger things to worry about than their sexual needs. He has a partner he likes and might even love waiting for him in his apartment. None of this is what comes out. "Do you have a place that isn't constantly monitored?" That might be playing with fire but Tim isn't anxious for any sexual escapades between them to be caught on film. 

"Ugh. No." Jason, honestly, nearly pouts. It's such a strange look that Tim is caught staring at him. It's kind of cute, even if the plushness of his lower lip makes him want to do terrible things. "What does that leave us with?" He's desperate, hopeful, and relying on Tim to make this work.

Oh God, why can't he think? Why can't he fucking think? He makes an agonized noise in his throat and Jason kisses the skin of his throat and that is really not helping him come up with a plan. "Hotel?" That seems like a waste but he has an expense account and Jason's rich. But that's going to involve finding a place and going to the front desk and then transferring themselves into a room...

"You said something about a back room?" Tim's heard about back rooms. He's even been in a few when working cases, but not for sex. It feels seedy and dirty and all kinds of _wrong_. But so far this bar has been nothing but mid to upscale. Don't those kind of backrooms only exist in places with strategic holes cut in the bathroom stalls?

“What kind of places do you hang out, Timmy?” Jason questions but he's grinning at him. “It's a nice back room. At least if you're going by normal back room standards. It has a door and everything.” He stands, his fingers linked with Tim's. It's like a current is passing through him. He's floating. He's ecstatic. He's going to do this with Jason Wayne. 

Tim doesn't see the denomination of bill Jason slips the guy guarding the door they pass through a moment later. The reek of sex is heavy in the air, but it looks more like a chicly lit fitting room than anything sordid. There are, true to promise, doors like dressing rooms. Jason picks one in a back corner and Tim has to wonder if he's done this before, and why he's a little jealous if he has. But of course he's done this before; why else would he know where the room was?

They don't waste any time. If this case has taught Tim anything it's certainly that there's no time to spare. He supposes being dead might have you learning that lesson in a far more brutal way. Jason shrugs out of his jacket and pulls off his t-shirt, revealing a torso littered with scars. It's still an incredibly toned, gorgeous torso that Tim can't help but run his hands over. 

“Little bit of a fetish there, Agent?” Jason questions, brushing his lips along Tim's jaw and making him shudder. When the dark-haired man manages to get his belt undone and his hand down his pants, Tim _squeaks_. Oh God. He wants the ground to swallow them whole. He wants Kon to call his cell with a breakthrough. He wants Jason's stupid, lazy bodyguard to have a change of heart and decide to hunt down his wayward charge. But Jason just grins and palms his cock and it feels way better than any not even hand job has a right to feel. 

“You're going to kill me,” Tim whispers but he's decided right at this moment that this is the way he wants to die. 

Jason bites against his neck as he nuzzles him. “You a foreplay kind of guy or you want to go right to the main event?”

Tim could make a good case for either, actually. If he and Jason were stretched out on a bed with no chance for interruptions he'd want to spend hours at this. He'd want to spend time exploring every scar, worshiping every muscle. He'd take his time to learn what makes the other man writhe and plead with him for more. 

They don't have that luxury, though. Not here. There's a chair but little else. He doubts Jason could even completely stretch out in this room. That adds an element of thrill to it, Tim decides. He's never done anything like having sex in near public with someone he's known less than a week. “Main event,” he whispers, fingers undoing the fly of Jason's jeans with relative ease. “Next time we'll go slow.”

“Next time,” Jason rumbles. “I like the sound of that.” 

So does Tim. He jerks Jason's jeans down his thighs before he loses his nerve. As it is, he finds out both that the man is commando and that his cock must have been very uncomfortable in the confines of his jeans. He knows it's rude to stare but _damn_. 

Jason doesn't comment on it, if he notices. He's busy mapping out the most sensitive places on Tim's neck and shoulder.“You prefer top or bottom?”

“Bottom's good.” Tim's surprised he still knows English, so much of his brain's capacity has become focused on sensation. “Condom?” 

Apparently Jason is always prepared because he pulls one out of his jacket pocket along with what Tim instantly assumes is antibacterial ointment in a single use pouch but is actually probably lube. His life is depressing that he's more familiar with first aid gear over sexual paraphernalia.”Did you think this would happen?”

“Hoped,” Jason admits. He has Tim's pants around his knees and spins him around, letting him brace on the chair. It's not Tim's most elegant moment. He ends up doing this odd little hopping motion he knows he's going to replay in his head later and totally cringe at. “It's okay,” Jason reassures him, large hands cupping his hips to help steady him. “You're still fucking hot.” And that's good to know because Tim feels clumsy and incredibly awkward. “There's just something about you, you know?” Jason asks with a low chuckle that makes his stomach flip flop. “Knew it since the minute I saw you.” 

Tim Drake might believe in aliens, but he doesn't believe in love at first sight. Lust maybe? It's true he's always felt a connection to Jason but he's never been sure how much of it was genuinely toward Jason and how much was because the story of his life (and death) interested Tim. 

He's definitely feeling a connection now. Especially when Jason's fingers push between his cheeks, spreading something slick and warm over his hole. Tim tries to relax as he pushes one inside him, but he can't hold back the gasp or the way his fingers clench against the chair. “It's been a while,” He says by way of apology and he swears he hears Jason purr in response. 

Tim knows his brain is letting little increments of sensation through, trying to filter out the unnecessary before he overloads. Normally he appreciates it, but right now he wants to feel _everything_. 

He can smell whatever lavender-scented cleaner they use back here. It's just under the scent of sex, of _Jason_ behind him. There's tasteful music, almost drowning out the carnal sounds from nearby but he's more focused on his partner's ragged breathing. The chair is hard and a little unstable and it's not going to be great to bend over like he'd originally anticipated. But Jason's fingers. Oh God. They're the perfect size to stretch him just this side of too far, to prepare him, and he knows exactly the right angle. 

It's going to be over too fast if he's not careful. Tim pants, trying to ease himself back from that edge. His cock is already plump underneath him, reaching for his abdomen, and he can hear the wet sound of Jason stroking himself off as he fingers him open. “Fuck me,” Tim tells him and it is definitely not a whine. 

The fingers hesitate inside him. “Are you ready enough?” Jason asks, mouth touching the back of his neck.

“Yeah, yeah.” He was born ready. Or at least he's been ready for this since the night began, if he's quite honest with himself. He turns as much as he can without losing the digits inside him, tearing open the condom for Jason and helping him roll it down over his shaft. Pinch the tip. Be careful of tears. Just like sex-ed and a banana, right? Tim's laughably out of practice. 

Jason removes his fingers and Tim does whimper then, shifting a little. Jason does the work for him, nudging his legs apart, having him brace against the wall with one of his knees on the seat of the chair. It does help significantly with the strain. He hopes Jason hasn't learned that trick by experience. This better not be something on some shitty sexual bucket list Jason has. Fuck an FBI agent? Check.

Those thoughts are pushed from his head with the first shove of Jason inside him. He's not harsh; far from it. There's just a lot of the man's cock to take. Tim makes a noise, turns it into a groan because otherwise he's just going to keep squeaking and what kind of impression is that? Jason's breath is warm on the back of his neck and it spreads through him like the heat and liquor in his veins. 

“Beautiful,” Jason breathes, kissing the shell of his ear. One large hand is splayed on his belly and he pauses to wrap it around his erection. Tim sees stars. He feels full. Stretched. Overwhelmed. This is maybe the best thing he's ever felt and as Jason starts to move it only gets better. “Doin' okay?”

“Yeah,” Tim replies, moaning and rolling his hips to encourage him to fuck him right at that angle. “It's perfect.” And any thought he's had about insisting he doesn't fall into bed with people so soon is promptly gone, because Jason doesn't care, and falling into bed (or chair. Or wall) with him is one of the best decisions Tim thinks he's ever made. His nerves are singing, every brush of Jason's calloused palm against his cock just sends him soaring higher. 

It's over too soon. With Jason mouthing at his neck, stealing kisses and the air from his lungs. He can feel the change in pace as he's fucked, the slight stutter of his hips as he tries to hold himself back and jerks Tim off all the faster. He's not going to leave him wanting and Tim is a little giddy at that. 

Orgasm is intense. Tim presses his face against the coolness of the wall and nearly shudders himself apart. He clenches down once and Jason moans, a low sound that he's going to cherish for the rest of his life, and buries himself completely inside him. “Fuck, Timmy,” Jason murmurs to him. “Oh, fuck.” 

That's the last thing he hears before the world grays out in the best way possible. Tim comes and comes, his body apparently taking this as the opportunity to release all his pent up everything. He can't think anymore. Can't breathe. Nothing matters besides the man behind him. _Inside_ him. 

He'd thought he would have broken his brain, zeroing in on everything so intensely, but he hasn't. He's still on his feet by some miracle, with Jason softly rubbing his back and mouthing his shoulder. “Still with me?” He asks, and he must have questioned before because he still sounds fond but also slightly worried. 

“Mhm,” Tim answers. He straightens up a little, finding Jason has pulled out and he's a little disappointed to have missed that underneath the pleasant buzz of everything else. But this way he can turn, can give Jason a proper kiss. Slow, leisurely, thoroughly exploring his mouth until his legs go weak.

“We should get back,” Jason whispers. “It's getting late.” 

It is. Tim knows it is. He presses his forehead against Jason's, having to get on his tiptoes to do so. Jason is already dressing them, without breaking that intimacy and he appreciates the other man giving him time to come down from the sex-induced high. “Next time we're doing it on a bed,” Tim says when his mouth can form words again. 

“You're on,” Jason answers with a grin. “I'm so glad we did that. I'm going to remember it for the rest of my life, Timmy.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Reviews/Comments always loved and appreciated. I also enjoy prompts and random chitchat. Hit me up here or [on tumblr](http://strikeyourcolors.tumblr.com/ask)! I do check it even if the account is dead.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry I'm a bit late with this! And will likewise be late next week as well (or maybe early?) because of the holiday. 
> 
> Warnings for this chapter include the bulk of the blood, gore, and torture. None of it is extreme but if you're sensitive that it should be noted.

Tim's head is pounding in time to the ringing of his cell phone. It's shrill and _loud_ and he picked the ringtone exactly for these moments when he wants to ignore it and go back to sleep. He hates his past self because the sound is too annoying to ignore. He gropes for his phone, squinting at the screen. It's not a number he recognizes and he's tempted, so tempted, to let it go to voicemail. 

Except he can hear Kon's phone ringing in the guest room. What are the odds of them getting two unrelated calls at the same moment? Not great, Tim decides, and he answers the phone. "Drake."

"Is Jason with you?" He doesn't recognize the voice right off, but he does know the high, frantic pitch of it. The man on the other end is _scared_ and that has the lingering feelings of sleep instantly fleeing his brain. 

"Who-" Tim starts, because it's too easy to fall into this trap. Maybe it's a prank. Maybe a jealous ex boyfriend. Maybe even a reporter and-

"This is Dick, his brother. Jason never came home last night and he's not answering his cell and no one can find him." He says it all so quickly it's a wonder the man doesn't run out of air, especially with the way he's hyperventilating. "Is he with you? He said he was with you."

Kon appears in his doorway, still in his pajamas so it must be pretty early. His face is pale, his eyes wide as their gazes meet. No doubt he's receiving similar information. "He's not here," he says into the phone. 

Tim has to repeat the statement. "Jason isn't with me. We walked out of the bar together and I saw him meet up with his bodyguard..." Tim knows that's what happened. He watched to make sure Jason was in capable hands. He was _careful_. "They were walking back toward the car. They got into it." 

He hears a pause and Dick speaking to someone else. "He says he went with Michael and got into the car." Then the voice on the other end of the line asks him, “What time was that?”

Tim is trying not to listen to Kon, who is explaining that he was in the apartment all night and hasn't seen Jason at all. He needs to focus on his own conversation. "After midnight maybe? It wasn't that late." Had he looked at the clock? No, Tim decides. He doesn't actually remember checking the time as he made his way to his apartment. “I got home before one this morning.” His heart is hammering. “Are there friends he could have stayed with maybe? Somewhere he would have stopped?" His mind has blanked out. It's defaulting to the basic question cops ask the family of a newly missing person. There had been a test on it, where the professor played the family member reporting the missing person. The man's behavior was startlingly accurate, now that Tim is experiencing it for himself.

"No. I've called everyone I can think of. Bruce is out looking. I'm picking Damian up from his before school program in case there's a threat to him." He takes another shuddering breath. "Damn it. Jason wouldn't do this to us again if he could help it. Something has to be wrong."

He has a sinking feeling that assessment is right. "I'll see what I can find out, okay? Can I call you back on this number?" Tim is scrambling out of bed, grabbing for clothes. Whatever he reaches first is fine to wear. Jason is _missing_. He's _gone_ and that can mean absolutely nothing good. 

He hangs up after Dick confirms his contact information. He has to slow down. He has to think this out. Panic is not going to help. He doesn't want to suspect who or what has Jason, but he fears he does. The question is where he is, and to what end? 

Kon tumbles back into his room, pulling a shirt on over his head. The bottom half of him is in jeans. Tim didn't even notice him leaving the room the first time. "The Waynes' butler called. What happened? What the fuck happened?"

It's not often Kon swears. Tim is torn between yelling back at him to release some stress or delving into the calm, logical side that can actually do some good. "His brother called me." That's a decent place to start. He feels dizzy with how fast his heart is beating. "We had a couple of drinks and talked. I came home.” He's sure he looks on the verge of tears, because he certainly feels that way. “I made sure he was with his bodyguard, Kon. I made sure they got in the car.” It's protocol for protecting a witness. Having sex with them in the back room of a bar isn't. His partner doesn't need to know this. God, he had sex with Jason and now he's _missing_.

"Why would they think he would be here?" The man demands but he's asking mostly himself. "How can someone disappear from here to there? Have they checked accident reports?"

The Waynes are hardly amateurs with this, Tim knows. They'll be calling the police. The police will handle anything that could have happened to Jason as far as their specialties such as illnesses or car accidents. They'd even be helpful with a regular kidnapping. If it's not any of those things? Tim is all Jason has. He feels the pressure of it, the weight of it sitting on his chest. "Bruce will be driving the route to look for anything," he replies, trying to reason out what they should do. "The cops will be checking hospitals and traffic reports." He's sure Alfred will be doing something similar. "We have to assume the Joker has him, Kon."

"That's insane," he spits back, kneeling to lace up his shoes. "That's absolutely insane, Tim. Some nutcase has him but it's not a demon. It can't be-" 

"It can!" Tim yells, surprising even himself. Kon looks shocked. Maybe because it's rare Tim even raises his voice, let alone at him. But he's angry. More than that, he's terrified, enough that his friend calling him insane doesn't even sting right now. "I don't care how insane I sound, Kon! It's true! If this thing has him again and it's going to fuck him up so badly that he won't come back from it this time! Not unless we get there in time." 

The traitorous heat of tears burns his eyes and he grits his teeth to will them back. He has to struggle to get his boots on over the thicker leg of the jeans he's wearing. He hasn't felt this helpless in so long. "I don't know how to stop it. I don't know how to banish it or whatever but we have to find him, Kon, and to do it we can't just be FBI agents." Tim stands, crossing the room in a few steps to the taller man to grip his partner's hands. "Please, Kon. I need you on this. I need you to help me save him." 

He meets his eyes. Tim tries to read his expression, but his partner's kept it purposefully blank. Cold and serious, but there's the lingering fear there. He likes Jason too. Maybe not as much as Tim does or in the same way but he hardly wants anything bad to happen to him. Again. "Alright." His face softens. "Alright, I'll follow your lead. I'm calling the Director though; we'll need help no matter what this is." 

Tim gives his hands a squeeze and, irrationally, wants to hug him. Later. If ever. He'll give his logical brain time so it can kick in. He can repress the terror right now because Kon is by his side. He finishes tying his boots while Kon calls Dinah to update her. The man's a stickler for the rules but it must hurt his pride to call with an instant admission they've failed in their mission.

He has no leads on the Joker's base of operations or where he might take Jason. It's not like you can pull property records on a demon. It has to be somewhere close, for Jason to have disappeared so quickly. It has to be somewhere not far off the course he would have taken to get home or someone would have seen something. 

He remembers that little note tacked into Abigail's file, suddenly, about a psychic being involved. _I don't do readings for the present_ , Roy had told him. _Not any more._ Which meant he had once. That meant he was capable. He has to be aware of the fact that Jason's missing. He has to be able to see _something_ that might help them. 

Tim grabs his stuff as quickly as possible. He needs his phone, his limited research and his weapon. He can see Kon doing the same, pulling on a blazer to hide his service pistol. "Director Lance isn't happy," he informs him in what might be the understatement of the year. "She's dispatching more agents." 

Good. That will help. Tim nods as he grips his partner's arm. "Roy Harper," he says. "He doesn't have a phone." 

Kon doesn't tell him this is a wild goose chase. He presses a Styrofoam cup of coffee into Tim's hands instead, followed by a breakfast bar. The sight of it makes Tim want to refuse it but Kon won't let him release it. "You need this. Your brain needs to keep working and your body needs to keep functioning and you need caffeine and food for both of those things." 

Tim has to take a deep breath, to control his emotions all over again. "Thanks, Kon. You're-" 

"Later," Kon says. "Let's go." They just have to hope there will be a later. 

He breaks several laws to get them to Roy Harper's apartment in a timely manner. Tim stares at his notes, at his theories, and tries to make sense of them. Jason wouldn't have gone quietly. No way. He wouldn't have gotten out of the car willingly either. 

That leads him to the bodyguard. Michael, who is also missing. Hadn't there been something in one of the police accounts about victims being lured to isolated locations? Surely Wayne examines his security team members thoroughly. 

He's on autopilot as Kon guides him to Roy's apartment. The door is already open. Roy is standing there waiting for them in shorts and a t-shirt, obviously newly awake. "He has Jason," Roy says simply. "Where is he?"

"We were hoping you could tell us," His partner replies, ushering Tim inside. "Have they contacted you?"

There's a shake of ginger hair. "I dreamed it. I think Jay was yelling for me." Roy looks sick. His skin looks almost clear it's so pale and Tim knows a thing or two about pale skin. The bruises under his eyes are deep. "I was hoping it wasn't true." 

"It is," Tim says bluntly. "We need your help." He wishes he had time for niceties. He wishes he could gentle Roy into this but he's aware of how limited their time might be to find Jason alive. "We need you to tell us where he is."

He doesn't have to explain the rest. Roy crosses his arms, eyes narrowing. "No. I don't do that." 

Tim wants to scream. He's lifting his foot to stomp it in frustration before Kon gives him a look. He knows what's about to happen. He can tell Tim is tempted to throw a fit pretty much like a toddler. It reins him in. "Please, Roy." He's using his first name, hoping to convey the sense of urgency. "Jason will die again and you know it. He could already be hurt. We have no idea where he is and you might be our only hope." _So help me, Obi-Wan_. Roy looks hesitant and regretful. It's not at all what Tim wants. "Please," The word catches in his throat. 

Roy looks truly stricken. It's like he's sick and in physical agony. Tim can feel Kon's hand come up to to his shoulder, the tenseness in his arm like he might physically pull him back to protect him. But then the redhead sags, eyes closing. "I'm not sure I can, okay? It's not something I can turn on and turn off." 

"Can you focus it though?" Tim knows he's whining. He's basically begging, desperate. "You have to try. For Jason." 

Kon looks bewildered by it all, nonbeliever that he is. Tim admires again his partner's tenacity before his attention is caught by Roy, reaching for him. He flinches, but the psychic is only after his wrists. "Hold your hands up. Palms toward me." 

Tim obeys, no question. He knows psychics have certain tics, certain things they can pick up. And his hands...oh no. He can see from the flash of embarrassment in Roy's eyes, in the dusting of color across his cheeks that he's seeing the last time Tim touched Jason. But he doesn't mention it, only rests his hands against Tim's so they are fingertip to fingertip. "One hand on Agent Drake. One on me," he instructs Kon weakly. "And don't...just don't freak out, okay?"

He's about to ask why he doesn't need to freak out, but when he opens his eyes (when did he shut them?) he's not in Roy's apartment anymore. He's standing with him, still touching his fingertips, but they're floating. It's somewhere gray, like they are shrouded in a heavy fog. "Where are we?"

"Shh," Roy hisses. His brow furrows. "I need to focus. Think about Jason." 

That shouldn't be hard to do; it's what Tim's mind has been fixated on since he first got the call. Longer, than that if he's honest. Since he met the man at the bar the night before there's been little else in his head other than how to save Jason and protect him. How would he feel about moving to D.C.? How much does Jason like Kon and vice verse because this is never going to work if his partner doesn't like him too? There's a ghost of a thought about Kon's easy smile dimming at the news they're dating but Tim shoves that aside. Not now. He focuses instead on if Jason would like Stephanie. He bets he could build a roomba army with Jason and they could even make them run complicated vacuuming obstacle courses. 

There are a million things centering around Jason Wayne in his head like he's been missing from Tim's life all along and has slotted in right where he's supposed to be. 

He barely blinks and they're not in the gray mist. It's a room though it's still damp and cold. There's moisture on the stone walls and no window. There's blood on the ground; little droplets and as Tim stares at them he can see a form shimmer in nearby. Jason. He's hurt, lying on his side, bruised and bloody. The details are difficult to make out and he starts to pull away, to go to him but Roy steps down on his foot. Hard. Tim yelps but Roy seems entirely unfazed. "Don't move. Don't let go." 

He's not holding on to him, but Tim assumes he means maintain the contact and, having his foot crushed aside, this is the _coolest thing_. He's with a psychic and they are astral projecting...where? Tim has to look for clues. Roy's eyes are barely open to slits. 

There's a door behind him and it is old and wooden. The whole place smells old. The floor is tiled and the walls are stone; a basement? And Jason is alive and alone. He looks upward. The ceiling is low but with support beams visible. They are a mix of wood and steel; it had to be reinforced so it's a publicly accessible building made to hold a lot of weight and subject to inspection for building codes. "Shut your eyes," Roy whispers. Tim doesn't want to; he needs to drink in every detail. But he doesn't want to break whatever trance this is. He does. 

He can hear things then. The distant rumble of traffic. Jason's breathing, staggered and through his mouth; his nose must be broken. There are voices, too. "-just have to wait-"

"-need one more thing before we can-" 

"We have to do this right or he will-" 

"Make the call." 

The last voice is familiar to Tim, somehow. It's drowned out by a booming, vibrating noise. It's one that resonates in his head and through his bones, over and over. It brings to mind something swinging. It's-

Tim gasps as he heaves forward. He stumbles a few steps, contacting something soft and decidedly not human. A couch. There had not been a couch in that room with Jason. "Tim?" Kon's voice. He cracks his eyes open to see his partner with Roy Harper held bridal style against him. 

"See?" Roy croaks out. "Told you...near water...and the number three was going to be important." He shivers again as Kon places him on the couch near Tim. "Go," he says. "I have to...rest. I can't even stand up.”

They have a lead. They have something. "What was that?" Kon demands. "You were just...standing there for a minute. Not moving. I didn't even think you were breathing." 

"You didn't see?" But Tim will have to interrogate him later when there's space in his thoughts that isn't reserved for this mystery. "Stay with Roy. I need to-" 

"No chance in Hell," Kon snaps. "I'm with you all the way. He said for us to go." The world tilts dangerously as Tim gets to his feet and he's actually relieved to have Kon's arm come around him to steady him, ground him. He's put the psychic on the couch and Roy is already slumped over. "Do you know where he is?" his partner asks. 

It's with frustration that Tim has to shake his head no. "Stone walls. Tile floor. Wooden door. Old construction, but recently put in a steel support structure. Near traffic. Near..." He tries to analyze the sound again. What had it been? 

"We'll take the route he had to have taken and see what strikes us," Kon decides. He pretty much carries him into the elevator and he allows it. It feels like an incredible amount of effort just to think, let alone move. "There's a district that's being revitalized, right? If we head toward the buildings that were first on the list maybe we'll turn up something." 

"They are waiting to hurt him severely," Tim says. "They're making a call for something they needed. They had to get it right." 

"Who is 'they'?" The elevator descends maddeningly slowly, Tim thinks. He's in an awful hurry for someone who can't walk correctly. 

He almost trips getting over the small threshold onto the solid floor. "People helping the Joker. They're in his service. You know how the research about said he needs an audience? This is it. His audience." He knew one of those voices. He knew that sound. They're locked away somewhere in his mind. “The book you took that note from didn't have anything else about the attention the Joker feeds on, did it?”

"No. Crap," Kon mutters, pausing so he can dig his keys out of his pocket. "How many of them are there?"

Of course his partner would be planning out potential manpower. "Don't know," Tim responds. 

Kon's cellphone rings the minute he has his key in his hand. He hands the key off to Tim, keeping a tight arm around him in case he tries to go running for the car as he answers his phone. "Kent." He pauses, listening. Tim can hear that the voice is female, but little else. Kon helps him shuffle slowly down the steps of the apartment building and to where the car is illegally parked in front of a fire hydrant. No ticket yet, which is good. One less thing to worry about. Tim unlocks it, transferring his weight from Kon to the passenger door. The man's face is serious when he drops into the driver's side and starts the car. "Wayne just received a ransom request. He's supposed to meet them in half an hour. He's turned off his phone and he didn't tell them where he was going. The police are frantic." 

It's like a bottle rocket going off inside Tim's head. He launches himself toward the backseat of the Versa, squirming between the driver and passenger seat, making Kon lurch to the side to avoid being hit. "What are you doing?" He demands, probably trying to decide if he should pull the car over and restrain Tim. 

"They needed to call for the thing they needed,” Tim babbles, nearly incoherently. “They called Bruce Wayne.” He opens one notebook and tears through it, flipping through the pages at rapid speed. 

"They needed the ransom?" Kon asks. He swerves to get in the lane that will be their fastest route to the bar he and Jason had been at. 

"Not the ransom. The Joker wants _Bruce_." It's like a light has been turned on in his mind. The sensation would be amazing if the implications weren't so frightening. "The Joker's first confirmed kill was Abigail Bryant. He wrote the meaning of her name on the wall near her body." 

Kon nearly misses a turn in the correct direction and swerves. Tim topples over as he takes it. "So?"

Tim types in the name to his phone, bracing himself in the seat. He copies it into a search engine, just to be sure. "Abigail means 'a father's joy' and that's what he took from her father. He took his joy. What's the link between all the cases, Kon?" Tim is torn between laughing or being sick. He hopes the windows back here unroll, just in case. "Parents,” he answers for him. “The Joker wants the suffering of the parents. That's why they find them. That's why he didn't hurt the orphans. He wants kids with parents who love them."

"He's building Wayne up," Kon realizes, catching on quickly to Tim's line of thought because he always does right when it matters. "He's building up his hope that he can save Jason. This time he's going to make him watch. So as soon as he gets there with the ransom..." 

"Jason's dead," Tim breathes. "Call Alfred Pennyworth. See if he has another means to reach Bruce. I'm going to try Dick." Kon is slower dialing than Tim is since he's driving. Dick answers on the first ring. “Is Bruce there?” Tim asks with no preamble. 

“He's still out. He's going to meet them with a ransom-” 

“No!” Tim almost shouts. Kon tosses his own phone to the side and onto the passenger seat. There must have been no answer from Alfred. “No! He can't meet them, Dick. If he gets there then they'll kill Jason” 

A beat passes before Dick seems to fully grasp the situation. “His phone's off. They told him they were watching him and if he broke the rules, Jason would suffer.” Dick is a cop or at least had been at some point. Tim remembers that, now that his mind is rooted on information instead of panic. “That's what they're going to do anyway, isn't it?”

Tim can't find it in his heart to deny it. “Yeah. Where would Bruce get the ransom money?” Where would be within half an hour of where Jason disappeared? “I thought he didn't negotiate with kidnappers?” Hadn't he read that somewhere? Something about Damian being kidnapped and how heartless Bruce was for not paying? 

“It's different with Jason.” Tim can hear the clack of a keyboard in the background. “It's always been different with Jason since he came back.” Dick pauses. “Bruce didn't go to Gotham Federal. He has an account at First Savings and Loan...” 

He's trying to look at the buildings they're driving past and listen to Dick at the same time. The man is smart, once he's past panic mode. Tim hopes the same can be said of him. “It's more than one person,” Tim tells Dick, because he suddenly wonders who will have this information if something happens to himself and Kon. Someone needs to. “It's a cult. They want Bruce to suffer the most and they're using Jason because he's marked somehow because he got away before.” 

Now he's the one who sounds like a raving lunatic, but Dick seems to take it in stride. “I think I found the account. I'm going to try to stop him.”

“Good. I'm going to find Jason.” He hangs up before he can second guess that declaration. He just wishes he had some clue of which direction to go. 

A church bell rings. The sound resonates, spreads through Tim, and he gasps. “The church.” 

“What?” Kon asks. “Which one?”

“The one with the bell!” Tim almost yells. “I heard the bell!” Of course. Jason remembers trying to go to a church for help the night he was killed. What if he'd been trying to run out of it? Abigail had gone every Sunday. A victim here or there had religious connections. It's a loose theory, basically non-existent without Roy's help, but it's there. 

Tim crawls back into the front and flips upside down to look out the windshield for a bell tower. Gotham was built up, rather than out, it seems. There are so many high buildings that he's already plotting the angry letter he's writing to the city architect when this is all said and done. “I think here. Park.” He has the sense to demand that instead of leap from the moving car. He did it once and it was enough to learn his lesson. 

Kon veers into a lot to park and narrowly manages to snag Tim's sleeve as he tries to run out the door. “Stop,” he orders. “Stop, Tim. Think. We can't just barge in there with no one knowing where we are or what we're doing.” His partner has a point. 

“I don't even know if he's in there.” But Tim _feels_ like he is. He believes it down to his very bones. He dials Dick again. Kon lifts his phone as well, calling for legitimate back-up. It goes straight to Dick's voicemail. “We're at this church.” He reads the name and the street sign. “Do not let Bruce come here.” He hangs up, checking his service weapon automatically. The gun feels heavy and not for the first time. Should he have invested in silver-tipped bullets? Would they even work against a demon?

“We have Lance's blessing if we feel he's in immediate danger,” Kon informs him as he hangs up and likewise checks his weapons. “I'm supposed to call again if we don't find anything and she'll cancel-” 

There's a scream. Tim swears it's a scream, at least. It's raw and agonized and doesn't sound like it's coming from a human throat. Kon rests a hand on his shoulder, apparently having heard it too. “Quietly,” He advises. “If there's that many of them...”

It would be dangerous for them and dangerous for Jason. Tim has to push any personal emotions aside. He can do this. He has to do this. He's been trained for this. “I'll take the front, you take the back? 

Kon shakes his head. “We're not trying to apprehend anyone. We should stay together.” He has a pinched set to his mouth. He's worried about what they are going to find. Tim can't blame him because he is too.

The door into the sanctuary is locked. Kon gives it a test rattle and then gestures to a side door. It's easier to kick down, and that's apparently what needs to be done. Tim draws his pistol and waits for Kon to do so; he never did get the hang for crashing through doors the way his partner did. It's a size thing and he doesn't have it, even if he does have the leg strength to kick them in.

What strikes him first is the smell. It's cloying incense that burns the back of his throat, but above that note is the smell of chemicals. Then there's the scent of burning flesh. Tim's stomach heaves nearly instantly at the implications but he pushes forward and into the building. 

It's dark inside and the heaviness of that feeling strikes him first, despite the sunshine outside. It's as though all the windows have been covered or blacked out, which would be quite impressive in an old church like this. Tim has to focus on Kon's presence behind him to stay grounded. There's no movement. No sound. No rush of minions coming to protect their sovereign demon lord. 

As they go deeper into the church, they soon discover it's because they are all gathered around something worse. The vestibule leads into the main sanctuary, if that's what it's still called. Tim's not religious; he's never been religious. He still knows that the atmosphere of the church has changed. There's something dark here. Something dangerous and repugnant has turned this place of worship into unholy ground.

Jason is naked on the altar, tied like a sacrificial lamb. Tim thinks for a moment they have incense burners around him as he sees smoke and then he realizes Jason's _skin_ is singed. Something has burned deep rivets into the flesh of the man's chest, laying bone bare where he's obviously been cut before. 

There are superficial cuts all over the rest of his body. His hands are both bloody and one of them is missing _fingernails_ and Tim feels a rage like no other settle like ice in his veins. He's heard people describe white hot fury but this is the opposite. It's black, cold fury that makes him think he could burn this building and everyone in it and not lose any sleep at night. 

They aren't the only spectators, either. Kneeling beside the first row of pews is Bruce Wayne. It's clear from the unnatural way his leg is positioned that it's broken. His gaze is focused on his son, writhing in agony.

It's the Joker, corrupting a church with his influence. He's driving his audience mad enough to become a cult. He's gone after the son who got away to get at the father whose joy was recovered. Tim feels trapped. He feels frantic. What can he possibly do against this? He may as well give up now. He should accept this fate will happen to Jason, like it happened to his parents, like it almost happened to Steph. Like it will-

“Everyone put your hands up!” Kon yells. His voice breaks the spell and Tim shakes himself, backing up a step to be closer to his partner. Kon is good and pure and is all that is right and well and perfect in the world. “Drop whatever you have and put your hands in the air! I'm a federal agent and I will shoot you!” 

Kon has to be scared. He has to wonder what kind of nightmare he walked in on as this kind of thing doesn't happen in his world. His voice is steady and strong and Tim wants to wrap it around himself like armor. His partner is by his side when he really doesn't have to be and the least Tim can do is try to keep him safe, because he couldn't do the same for Jason.

There are only about eight other people in the church. Two of them actually do put their hands in the air over their heads and Tim has a brief, irrational hope that this might end decently. But of course those hopes are quickly dashed when three others rush forward, one of whom is hurling lit candles at them. They're not very effective as weapons but they're _dangerous_ in an old building with so much wood. 

Tim makes a point of stomping the closest flame out as he lifts the other foot to kick one of the cult members in the face. She's small, smaller than him even, and he might feel a little guilty when it isn't reflex taking over. He also realizes he recognizes her; it's the waitress from the restaurant. 

Jennifer goes tumbling backwards and Tim turns around to pry one of the other cultists off Kon's back. He's all but pistol whipping the first in the temple, trying to knock him unconscious. There's no finesse to their movements; just a whole lot of aggression. They're crazy, possibly demon possessed, and they have nothing to lose.

He's keeping a mental count of their would-be enemies. There were originally eight of them. Three are attacking them. Two have run. It leaves the guy guarding Bruce (Michael! The fucking bodyguard, ironically) and two more at the altar. One of them has a jar of something she's about to pour over Jason's face. “Drop it!” Tim yells. He moves to clear a shot at her. He's never going to make it. 

A gun goes off beside him. The woman drops, screeching as the contents of the jar spill all over her. Kon. Kon just shot someone. He's not even sure if the bullet wound or the chemical solution eating through her clothes is going to be more harmful to her and he doesn't have time to muse on it. He immediately goes back to elbowing the woman on his back who is trying to bite him through his jacket now that she's been removed from Kon. “Is everyone insane here?!?” He demands. He sounds on the verge of it himself. 

Apparently the answer is yes, because Bruce Wayne takes one look at the two of them and tackles Michael to the ground. It's a graceless flop that relies a lot on the element of surprise and the fact that Bruce is not a small man because there's no way he's getting a lot of momentum with a broken leg. It works; but it's not going to last for long. Tim grips the hair of the woman on his back and _yanks_. He feels some of it come out in his hand but it makes her let go so that he can drag her to the ground. She's not a fighter. She's not trained. One pinch to the nerve of her arm and she's on the floor wailing and holding her elbow like he's broken it. There's no time to deal with her. 

“Jason!” Bruce screams. “Get Jason!” For a man with a broken bone, he's doing an impressive job keeping a trained bodyguard down and punching him in the face. 

Kon doesn't even hesitate. There's no need for communication between them, Tim thinks. Kon's going to help Bruce, he's going to save Jason, and that's the end of it. There's an implicit trust there to have one another's backs and to not get killed. Tim's certainly going to do his best. 

He hopes that Jason has passed out by now. As he approaches the altar, he can see the man's eyes are wide open and definitely aware. Damn. The cultist looks Tim over and fucking grins like his cohort isn't lying on the ground with clothing smoking. Tim knows he doesn't exactly fit the stereotypical mold of masculinity to rush in to save anyone but it infuriates him even more. “I'm a federal agent,” he repeats because he has to try to end this the regular way. “Put your hands on your head and drop to your knees.” 

“Just shoot him!” Jason struggles with his bindings, despite how much pain he must be in. “Seriously just kill this fucker and get me out of here. Something worse is coming!” 

"You're too late," The man says calmly. The grin is still pissing Tim off. "The ritual has been invoked. He's already on the way."

"Kill him!" Jason shrieks again. He sounds nearly hysterical and that doesn't seem right. Not over this converation. He doesn't seem like he would fall to pieces while still tied up. "Fucking kill him!" Maybe Jason is possessed or maybe he's drugged. 

Or maybe something worse is coming. 

His priority has to be Jason. He has to get him off the altar and out of the church. A glance at Kon shows that he's still trying to manage Bruce and Michael the piece of shit bodyguard. Tim's on his own for the moment. "Step back," he orders. "Keep your hands where I can see them."

They don't teach you this at the academy. They don't teach you what to do when your biggest threat is what you can't see. The man actually does _jazz hands_ at him as he backs away with a maniacal giggle that does all kinds of things to unsettle Tim. 

He doesn't look at the bloody ruin of Jason's chest. He doesn't focus in on his injuries. If he does he won't be able to do his job. He needs to untie Jason. He needs to-

Tim touches the altar and it's like he's come into full contact with an electric fence. Jason screams, Tim thinks maybe he screams too but honestly he can smell his hair burning and it feels like he lost a second of time and then his back is slamming against the ground several feet away from the altar. He's even off the platform it's on.

"Tim!" It gives Kon the inspiration to finish his fight maybe a little more brutally than he would otherwise, slinging Michael (who definitely has some broken bones in his face courtesy of Bruce, Tim notes giddily) onto his stomach as he runs for him. The scene has evolved into chaos quickly enough. He can point out at least ten mistakes they've made against their training and Kon won't be happy about that later, providing they survive. 

"I'm fine," Tim tells him even if his nerves are twitching and it feels like his heart is beating out of rhythm. "We have to get Jason down." The cultist near him doesn't seem intent on doing anything to him directly. He's simply standing, laughing like he's heard the world's best joke and can't stop. 

Tim sees it then. There's a greenish tinge to his hair. The reek of blood that he'd thought was because of Jason is getting stronger. The blonde woman who had been torturing Jason prior to Kon punching her is giggling, rolling to her knees to bow and this really, really isn't good. You don't bow to just anyone with your eye swollen shut and nose smashed.

It isn't the lead cultist who stands there any longer. It's the Joker beside the altar with Jason Todd bound and bleeding and his father watching and unable to stop it. It's exactly what Tim swore to protect him from. 

He's looking at a demon. The feeling surges through Tim and he will never be able to explain or describe it except that he knows this isn't an earthly being. The demon is nearly skeletal, gaunt like his bones are just barely covered in pasty, unnatural flesh. He sheds all the trappings of humanity as Tim stares. His teeth are jagged and sharp and bared in a grin. He's not so much abnormally tall as abnormally _long_ and Tim fixates on his hands that are not hands at all but _claws_. They're same claws Tim sees in his nightmares.

Bruce breaks the spell first. He drags himself up to stand on his good leg and it must hurt an incredible amount but he is a father trying to get to his son. "Stop! If it's me you want then take me! Jason has nothing to do with this." 

That's...new. Usually when confronted with their first taste of the supernatural, people freeze. They panic. They stare in confusion as the very foundation of their earth has been shaken. Not Bruce Wayne. So either he's some type of superhuman or...

Or he's seen it before. The first time with Jason, perhaps, but then the truth comes out.

"I didn't get your dearest dad's pain when he stepped in front of the bullet for you," The Joker says, his head tilting in a way no human neck should be able to accommodate. "But this is even better!" His maniacal laugh sends shivers down Tim's spine. He wants to gag.

He tries to get his own legs to work right. Kon has him by his arm and his shoulder, trying to get him to his feet but his legs simply refuse to support his weight.

"You get to watch," Joker says. The voice hurts Tim's ears to listen to and from the way Kon is cringing he gathers he's experiencing the same thing. "You get to watch me consume your boy. You know, the one you thought you could keep away from me? The one you _reclaimed_."

Bruce falls, with very little to catch him. But even nearly faceplanting against a grate blocking the cold air return doesn't stop him. Tim would admire his tenacity if he weren't so furious that this all might have been avoided had he been honest with him the other day. It's the same anger he felt at his own father for doing something stupid without reaching out or thinking it through. 

The Joker touches the side of the altar and Jason screams again. His struggling is wild, especially when the blonde on the ground starts to giggle all over again. Joker crawls on top of the man and sinks those rotten looking, sharp teeth into the meat of his captive's shoulder. The demon's body convulses and he seems to be swallowing. The smell of burning flesh is thick in the air.

"We have to stop this," Tim whispers, still struggling to get to his feet as much as Bruce is. Jason is in agony. Jason is being burned. He has to help him. "We have to- Kon!" He's interrupted by gunfire. Kon has seen a clear shot and taken it. He's taken several. Tim can see the impact of the bullets in the Joker's flesh before they simply _aren't there anymore_. There are no impact marks. The bullets are gone. Kon drops his empty gun.

His partner is running before he even realizes it. Kon who doesn't believe in the supernatural. Kon who has rolled his eyes every step of the way but still gone along with it. Tim swears he sees Joker's eyes widen a bit in surprise before Kon tackles him off Jason with all the power of an all-American football pro. 

That's probably not the way to fight a demon, but it's certainly effective for the time being. Kon and Joker both go flying off the altar and the rush of adrenaline at seeing it gives Tim the strength to push himself forward. He'll get there if he has to _crawl_.

"Enough of this madness!" The booming voice is like the bells above them. It stills everything and Tim can't see what's going on except that Kon just got slammed against a wall.

A man is standing to the side of the altar like he's been there the entire time and simply gone unnoticed, which Tim knows can't be true. He's wearing an honest to God _cape_ , green and gold and terribly expensive looking. His salt and pepper hair is peaked in an unfortunate style and Tim can't even begin to fathom where he came from or whose side he might be on. 

"You promised he would be safe!" Bruce calls to him. "Now save him, Ra's!" 

Not for the first time, Tim wishes he had the ability to freeze a moment in time so that he could analyze it before hitting play again.. Then he might have some clue what's going on. He keeps crawling. Not to Jason this time, but toward Kon. His partner looks dazed; he cracked against the wood paneling pretty hard. 

The man in the green cape turns to stare first at Bruce, then at him. But when Tim looks back they lock gazes and it is one of the most unsettling sensations he's ever felt and he's just been electrocuted. It's like the man is looking through his skin. It's like he's peering at his soul. "Take them from this place," he orders and Tim knows, somehow, that he's the only one being spoken to; that he's been chosen. The gaze of those brown eyes is intense, sweeping over him, and Tim feels like he's being measured down to the core of his self. "Hurry!" 

Tim's hand grips Kon's arm, shaking him gently. The Joker's attention has been diverted and he's squaring off with the man in the cape. That's great. He's not going to complain about whatever buys them some time to run. "Kon," he urges. "Come on. I need you. We have to get them out of here." 

Kon visibly appears to shake himself and Tim wonders if that's the hardest he's ever been hit while tackling someone. "That thing going to shock you again if you touch it?" Of course his first thought is for Tim and he feels a little humbled by that fact. 

"Let's find out," he breathes. "Grab Wayne. We need to get out of here." He's not really going to take the words of a man in a cape at complete face value but honestly Tim had been planning to escape anyway. This helps. 

Tim staggers back to the altar, his legs getting more coordinated the closer he gets and prepares himself to be blasted to kingdom come when he touches Jason. He lightly brushes his fingers against his ankle and...nothing. Only bruised, puffy skin beneath his fingertips. Quickly, he starts to untie him, noticing that Kon has waited to go assist Wayne. Apparently he'd been ready to catch Tim like he was a softball and that's reassuring too. 

Jason moans a little, eyes fluttering open by the time he gets to the last chain holding him down. Tim startles a little; one of his eyes has black sclera. For a moment he's worried about brain damage, but it's not like they can stop and have the man lie still until a neurospecialist arrives. 

Jason is bigger than he is and much heavier. His chest is a wide open wound that Tim can't touch and that makes carrying him a logistical impossibility for a moment. 

But Jason responds to his touch, and stands up on coltish, shaking limbs. "Didn't break my legs," he tells him. "This time." 

Still, it has to hurt. What is it with the Joker and broken bones? He meets up with Kon halfway to the door and Bruce stubbornly stops, making him and Jason go first. It's kind of suicidal because honestly Tim is painfully aware they are moving at a snail's space with Jason half draped over him with the good, uninjured side of his body.

Joker and their would-be savior are still circling each other and Tim can't tell what they're doing. He wants to. He wants to go back in and absorb every detail like a sponge. He also wants them all to live through this so he keeps walking. And Kon says his priorities are jacked up.

He's not sure how they do it, but somehow they make it to Kon's Versa. Tim drags Jason into the backseat and Kon all but slings Bruce into the front before he scrambles into the driver's seat. He's barely turned on the car and shifted it into drive before something solid and human slams into the car door on Jason's side. The blonde from before has apparently found her feet. She doesn't seem like her broken eye socket and bleeding face are any hindrance at all. After her, the man who Kon had taken down jerks to his feet like a puppet on strings.

"They're coming for the car!" Tim says like that isn't obvious. "Go, Kon!" Because his partner is going to need some encouragement to potentially run people over and he is exactly the person to give it to him. 

Bruce doesn't seem to notice the chaos. His eyes are firmly on Jason, whose wounds have definitely been aggravated by their flight. Tim can feel the blood pouring over him, and can see it soaking into Kon's seats as Jason desperately shifts to find a comfortable position. "I'm so sorry, Jason." 

"Get us to a hospital." Tim knows that Kon's already thought to do that because the man is awesome and on top of things and probably thinking far more clearly than the rest of them. He flinches as the blonde woman hurls herself onto the trunk of the car, sliding off a moment later as Kon accelerates. It's like a zombie movie come to life, and not one of the better ones. His partner mows down a small fence and drives through a flower bed to get to the road before speeding away. 

For a moment there's quiet. No one pursues. There's no demonic presence about to eat one of them. "Told you that a Versa is a baby car," Tim mutters. 

The church erupts into flames behind them. 

"I hate Gotham," Kon replies with conviction.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments, reviews, and moments of outrage always read and appreciated! Got any prompts or wanna strike up a private conversation? Drop them here or [here](http://strikeyourcolors.tumblr.com/ask)!


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We've made it to the end! Sort of. At least the end of this fic. There will be a very short prologue next time, then look for something updating on "I Don't Want to Believe" next, if you keep up with this series!
> 
> No warnings for this chapter that haven't already been mentioned. I rarely do musical accompaniment but [this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kBqqlW6-99M) seemed fitting.

Driving up to the emergency room to drop off Bruce Wayne with a broken leg and his completely naked son with wounds that looks more and more like ground beef is one of the weirder things to happen in Tim's life. It's of the more frightening ones too, despite the fact that Jason had been awake the entire trip. Just when Tim thought he'd passed out, Jason had startled a few times, his breath catching, his eyes wide and terrified. That's not how Tim wants to remember him. 

He and Kon are banished to the waiting room and, hilariously enough, locked inside. Tim knows from the moment he hears the lock turn behind them that it's to detain them for questioning by police. Instead there will be one pissed off FBI Director coming to collect them in short order. Police and FBI alike are already descending on the church. The fire was quickly put out and there are no fatalities reported so far. He's not sure what happened to the members of the cult, but there's enough evidence in the basement of the church that they shouldn't be in too much trouble. 

They receive information only through their cell phones and a news broadcast, at first, imprisoned as they are in one of the hospital rooms. Alfred informs them that Bruce has a broken shin and a dislocated hip, as well as some potential spinal damage. They don't hear anything about Jason. 

Tim tries not to fixate on the way Jason had clutched his hand in the car or the thready, whimpering sounds that escaped his lips when he was loaded onto the stretcher. It was like every bit of strength he had left was abandoned in the church and he'd expended the last of his strength to escaping. Tim wants to go back and join the investigation. He wants to hunt down Bruce Wayne and demand answers to the million questions he has, spinal damage or no. Namely, he wants to know why this had to happen in the first place when Bruce had all the keys to stop it.

Instead they get a security detail and a work up. The FBI agents are the ones to let them out of the room and, under the supervision of a local cop, escort them through the procedures necessary. There's physical evidence gathering from their clothing and drug tests. They run _blood_ tests and Tim has to turn away because he might be sick if he has to look at more blood. He might have just developed a new aversion. They are advised by Dinah not to talk to local police, so they don't. Tim kind of expects to be arrested, but surprisingly it's decided that they should be escorted back to his apartment.

Tim finds that he's leaning on his partner as they ride in the back seat of a government-issued sedan. He's soaking up his presence, his comfort, until at last Kon wraps an arm around his shoulders and huddles with him. The movement is careful; the man's back is bruised badly from being slammed into that wall even if he managed to take the impact so that nothing broke. They both made it out of the church without severe injuries.

The FBI agents assigned to guard them aren't ones Tim is familiar with but they introduce themselves as Winters and Buzz. Buzz won't tell them if it's a first name or a last name. 

Coffee is the first thing Tim wants when they are in his relatively cramped apartment. He needs more space if he's going to have two extra people around. "Why are we being observed?" Kon asks, as though they'll answer more in the privacy Tim's residence provides and information was only being withheld because they were in public. "Are we being arrested? Sanctioned?"

"No," Winters tells him. She looks in a mirror in the entry hall, scooping stray strands of her hair back into a bun. "We've been instructed to protect you. I'm also going to take your initial statements and Buzz is here to provide you with emotional support." 

Buzz grunts and nods. Tim somehow doesn't feel reassured. "It was me," he says. "All of it was me. Kon was just there because I dragged him along and really he doesn't deserve discipline because I pretty much forced him into every insane thing that we did." 

Kon shoots him a look that could probably kill. 

"Interesting," Winters says. "Have you always been this much of a martyr?"

"You're a therapist, aren't you?" His partner questions. Apparently he knows more about this than Tim, because he's starting to feel like he's about to be dragged off somewhere with padded walls. 

Winters simply smiles. "Do you mind if I get a cup of coffee? I'm sure you want to clean up." She has the decency not to look at Tim, covered in blood and worse things, with disgust. The hospital staff stopped caring about treating him when they realized none of it was his.

"He'll bite you if you take too much coffee," Kon warns her. "You're like the emotional recovery unit or something, aren't you? The people they send in when really weird shit happens?"

"OhmyGod," Tim breathes. "Are you here to wipe our minds? Like you're going to interview us and let us get comfortable and then erase what we remember?" He's got no filter at this point. He needs coffee to fix that. Actually, a mind wipe of the past few hours would probably help, too.

Buzz starts to chuckle. Considering he's a mountain of a man who is probably a foot taller than Kon it's a little alarming. 

"Absolutely not," Winters replies. Then she seems to reconsider. "Well, it might involve some mind tampering but it's not going to be yours. Buzz and I will keep watch while you two get decent." 

Tim finds that he isn't sure what to do. He makes it to his bedroom before he simply stands there, staring at the wall but not seeing it. His mind is fixated on the sight of Jason bound to the altar and Kon flying over it to protect him. He doesn't deserve either of these men in his life because what could he offer them?

"Hey." Kon's voice is soft as he comes up behind him. He pauses to close the door fully behind him, then slowly slides his arm around Tim's waist. "Are you okay? And don't feed me that shit you fed everyone else at the hospital."

Tim takes a shuddering breath, feeling his resolve to insist that this is fine and he's okay melt away. Kon's good at finding out his true feelings, too. "Just a little...twitchy? My head's buzzing. I need some coffee." He's relieved at his friend's noise of amusement. "What about you?"

"Gonna bruise but nothing is broken," Kon answers, like Tim hadn't found that out at the hospital. "Kind of super confused and I feel like I've been awake for a thousand years instead of eight hours but that'll pass." For a moment they just stay locked together, swaying a little bit. Kon's cheek rests on the top of his head and Tim shuts his eyes and soaks in the comfort in a way he can only from a precious few people. "You should get cleaned up, though. They're playing nice now but I'm not sure it will last." 

There's the cynical part that Tim has bred into his partner after all these years. "I wish they would tell us something about Jason," he confesses. "I wish I knew-"

"I know," Kon reassures him. "Really. I'm sure they'll let us know when the prognosis isn't changing every five minutes." That will be when Jason is well, or when he's dead, probably. "Now go shower. For once someone collected all your weird little samples in baggies for you." 

That's true. Tim doesn't have to bother to catalog blood stains or injuries. He takes a few baggies in the bathroom just in case he finds something they missed at the hospital, and then he's glad to shower. He scrubs himself raw, washes his hair twice, and actually spends time properly drying off since he needs to put on clothes for the strangers (who Dinah vouches for, but still) in his apartment. 

He drinks one cup of coffee in about five minutes and goes for another before he's ready to sit down with Winters. Buzz has Kon in Tim's office for his statement since it's policy to separate partners for the first interview. Winters gets out a familiar tape recorder and sets it on the table between them, waiting for Tim to nod before she starts it. "This is Agent Winters with Agent Timothy Drake. We are in his apartment on-" She gives the date and the time. She follows it with his address and then she looks steadily at him. "Start from the beginning." 

He tries. He's sure that he goes off on tangents in some places, but he tries to keep it to the basic facts of what happened and not his thoughts or opinions on the topics.

Winters leans back after a moment, sipping from her own coffee cup. She turns off the recorder. "Now," she says. "Tell me what you think happened." 

He stares at her, wondering if this is some kind of trick. 

"Director Lance's orders," The female agent says. "I'm supposed to give her the rundown so she can decide what to do." 

Hell, if he does get his mind wiped it won't be the worst thing that's happened to him today. "I think it was a demon," he begins. "I was doing some research..." 

~*~*~

Buzz turns something on television for them like they're children. It's mindless and, as far as Tim can tell, about a little boy who discovers friendly ghosts in his house. It also involves musical numbers by said friendly ghosts. Kon doesn't seem to be excited over that but Tim is too numb to care. He makes sure his phone is close by and he waits. 

His requests to go to the hospital are met with refusal. Tim is still trying to decide how far he'll get if he escapes out a window. Buzz brings them soup (from what ingredients it came from Tim has no idea because all he had in the fridge were leftovers) and he feels like it's swallowing glass. Surely, they would tell him if Jason isn't going to pull through. 

Finally, _finally_ his phone rings. It's Dinah who simply says "Jason Wayne is asking for you." 

That's a good sign, isn't it? It means Jason is coherent enough to ask for him and well enough to be allowed visitors, but part of Tim wants to stay with Kon because, contrary to whatever his partner would have them all believe, he knows he's not fine. 

"You should go,” The man tells him simply, trying to eat around the carrots in his soup under Buzz's watchful eye. "You need me to come with you?"

He doesn't, but it would be helpful and welcome. Still, Tim shakes his head. He needs to do this on his own. 

Winters escorts him to the hospital and Dinah meets them in the waiting room to escort Tim back to a private wing. "How is he?" He questions when he can't stand it any longer. He wants to be prepared, braced, and Dinah's the only one feeding him any information. 

She frowns. The expression doesn't look at home on her face. She's been wearing her leather jacket since she got here, as far as Tim is aware, and it's like her version armor so chances are things haven't gone particularly smoothly. "There was some bad damage physically. Most of the cuts were superficial but they went through tendons in a couple of places. There are chemical burns over his neck and chest down to the rib at some points. Infection is going to be the biggest danger now that they've replenished his blood volume." 

Tim can see her hesitate as they reach the doorway. "But what?" He prompts. "There's something else." 

"You're sharp." Bruce Wayne edges from the shadows down the hall. He's in a cast and has a brace up to his waist, but he's hobbling along on crutches like he's done it before. "I suppose I have that to thank for my son's life." 

"That and other things," Tim replies, staring at him steadily because he doesn't like being left in the dark, especially when things could have turned out so much worse. 

Dinah sighs. "You boys play nice." But instead of babysitting, she abandons Tim. She abandons him in a dark hospital hallway with Bruce Wayne who is probably the cause of all their suffering today. 

"Later," Bruce tells him. "Later I'll answer your questions about what happened and what I know. But right now? Jason has been wanting to make sure you got out. He wouldn't listen to us when we told him." The man pauses and shuts his eyes a moment. Tim notes threads of gray in his hair, how worn and tired he looks in this lighting even if he seems at home in the shadows. "The real damage is mental, Agent Drake. The sensations of what happened and feelings of helplessness opened a lot of mental scars that we thought were dealt with." 

Tim can only imagine. He rests his hand on the door, lightly, knowing it's so easy to push it open. Bruce keeps going "We can fix it. We can erase those sensations from his memories but it would take the memories of what caused them, too." That has to mean...a psychic. Bruce Wayne has a fucking psychic in his employ somewhere. Tim wants to laugh. He also wants to leap on the scrap of information like a starving animal on a piece of meat. 

But he can gather now why Jason wants to talk to him. 

The hospital room isn't quiet and Tim is grateful. He remembers a nearly silent few hours passing as he sat by his father's bedside after he died, until the coroner arrived to make his report and the morgue took the body. The television is on in Jason's room, and there's a radio playing soft classical music as well. Jason looks mummified in his bandages and there are tubes here and there, but Tim knows how to ignore them. 

"Hey," he says softly. He rests his fingertips at the crown of Jason's head, moving them down to his hairline. 

Jason struggles to awareness. His eyes are hazy, but Tim is absolutely relieved that they're normal. No blackness in them at all, just that stunning teal shade. "Hey yourself," he counters, voice slightly slurred. But he frowns as he remembers, apparently, that Tim is here for something important. "They tell you?"

There's just enough space for Tim to sit on the bed beside him. It feels too intimate and yet it feels right. "Yeah. That they can take the memories away of what happened." 

"Not...zactly." Jason grimaces and Tim spies some ice chips in a cup beside the bed. He scoops some up with a spoon, letting the man roll them in his mouth for a moment to moisten it. "It would take anything that caused high sensation or high emotion for the last couple of days." 

Tim doesn't need it spelled out that them having sex provided both of those things. He hasn't really had time to process it. He doesn't know what it meant or where it left them. There would be time when Jason was safe, he thought. They would have maybe had a nice dinner and gone on an actual date and talk out what they want and what they expect.

Not anymore, Tim is coming to realize. "If that's what you need to get better," he tells Jason when he trusts his voice. "Then that's what has to happen and that's okay." 

Jason looks intensely frustrated, turning his face away from Tim's attempt to feed him more ice chips. "It's not okay. I don't want to lose my memories. But I can't...I can't live with this shit in my head. Every time I shut my eyes. Every time it's quiet. Every time they poke or prod I'm right back there." 

"On the altar?" Tim dares to ask. 

"On the floor," he answers with a sigh. "Getting killed."

He remembers that Jason told him about putting bandaids on his psyche. It's been years since it happened, but do you ever really get over something like that? It's not a hopeful thing to admit, but you probably don't. The man has been managing relatively well and now he's back to step one. Step zero, even. 

His fingers stroke along Jason's scalp. He can feel the scars there, buried beneath coarse hair. "I don't want you to forget what happened between us either," Tim admits, because only honesty is going to see him through this. "But your health, physical and mental, are more important. _You're_ more important and I do think you need this." 

Jason's hand lifts and he pulls Tim down, until he is lying stretched along the other's uninjured side. He pushes his face against his shoulder, shutting his eyes and just wills himself to come up with a better solution. He'd come in here prepared to fight for Jason's right to remember. He'd had a billion retorts for Bruce about how life is painful and sometimes you have to deal with it to get stronger.

But this is what _Jason_ wants and thinks he needs. And Tim, if he's honest with himself, thinks that too. He can't imagine living with the demons in Jason's head. There's one that literally tried to suck his soul out. It's the same one that killed him.

"It's like it was yesterday or like it was an hour ago. I can't go back to that place, Tim." Jason's voice, fuck it, is so broken. It's so guilty.

Tim kisses the corner of his mouth, because he's not going to be able to do it again for a while, is he? He's had a bunch of firsts and now it's a bunch of lasts. Or at least, it's putting a lot on pause. "You're not losing me," he replies. "Right? You're just forgetting that we had sex. Not that we flirted or...or anything..." 

"Not that I like you," Jason agrees and he makes a face that is probably supposed to be charming but comes off a little drugged. "God, I'm so fucked up. You should probably take this opportunity to run." 

Maybe Tim should, but more for Jason's safety than his own. "I'll take a pass," he replies glibly. "I hate cardio." 

Jason snorts. "Your partner told me that one, but that you're good at it." He sighs again, shifting in a way that Tim knows means he's in pain. But any time he tries to get up he's drawn back to Jason's shoulder. 

They stay like that for maybe half an hour, and Tim soaks in every moment of it. It's not the best of circumstances but his life never has been and he wants to take everything he can get. "It was great," Jason says at last. "Like I really mean it and you know I'm not just setting myself up to get in your pants again, right?"

Tim didn't think he'd be smiling again today, but somehow Jason has made him. "Yeah. Same here. Five of five would recommend to a friend." 

Jason starts to laugh, then tenses up. "Oh, fuck," he wheezes and monitors go wild around him. Tim barely gets him into the recovery position before a nurse peeks in and, seeing nothing scandalous is going on, approaches Jason's bedside. 

"We warned you about this, Mr. Wayne." She sighs. "Your...visitor will be arriving shortly. A sedative has been requested so we need to get that going."

"Yeah, yeah. No fun until I'm healed up." Jason's fingers are still wrapped around Tim's. Tim doesn't want to let go, but he knows he's going to have to. He's trying not to panic at the thought. "We'll have fun then, okay? Promise. Cross my heart. Swear on my life. All of that." 

Tim nods because he really, really doesn't want to burst into tears right now. He tries to focus on the nurse as she puts a syringe in Jason's IV line. But he can't resist, can't just let this go. He leans forward to press his lips against Jason's as quickly as he can manage. "I'll come see you tomorrow." Then he'll see what the damage is. 

Jason gives him a dopey smile as he falls asleep. 

Tim is curious to know what's going to happen and how it's going to be done, but the evasive language makes him think this particular psychic doesn't want their methods or name well known. He walks out of the room and tries to pretend everything is normal. 

"She won't take everything," Bruce says. He's still keeping his vigil outside Jason's room, though he at least has a chair pulled against the wall now. "I've made sure of that. It's the bare minimum for him to be...alright again. He'll struggle but it won't be like it was." That was apparently bad, judging by the haunted look on Bruce's face. 

"I'm sure," Tim says and he can't help how clipped his tone is.

Bruce seems to slump. "I don't enjoy this. I don't enjoy what risk my family is exposed to. But she's going to put in a fail safe this time and Jason will remember on his own when he's ready, when he's healed and he's capable of it."

"What if he never is?" Tim counters. "He'll never remember."

"I have to believe that's for the best." 

It would be a tough decision to make. It doesn't have Tim resenting Bruce Wayne any less. 

"Let's have coffee again in a couple of weeks, Agent Drake," Bruce says softly. "I'm sure you have questions." 

"I'm sure you'll have answers by then," Tim counters bitterly and walks away. He can't turn back. He can't slow down. The temptation to run back to Jason, to beg him not to do it, is selfishly rising up in him. 

Winters is still in the waiting room for him, which is good, because Tim probably would have just walked to his apartment otherwise. The air has a kind of chill in it he doesn't remember from before. Maybe this is shock. Maybe to him shock just makes him temperature intolerant and makes it very difficult to eat. 

He barely remembers getting back to his apartment. He shuffles to his room, stripping clothes as he goes and finally curling up under the covers in his underwear, shirt, and socks. It's five minutes before Kon comes in. 

“Hey,” He says. “Didn't go well?”

Tim bites his lip. He hates lying to his partner but at this point why even bother with the truth? None of it matters. “Jason should be okay physically. Mentally...they think it will be like before. They think he'll block out some of it. At least he'll get rid of the more intense stuff.” 

“That's good though, right?” Kon asks. Tim feels his eyes start to water, and Kon notices too since he instantly looks stricken. “I'm sorry, Tim.” 

Kon doesn't even know what he's sorry for, but Tim still believes him. It's all it takes for the dam to burst and Tim finds himself locked in a hug, trying not to cry too loudly against Kon's shoulder. They still have two FBI agents waiting outside the door, after all, and he has a reputation to uphold.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Reviews/Comments always loved and appreciated. Prompts and discussion likewise terribly enjoyable. Drop a comment here or [here](http://strikeyourcolors.tumblr.com/ask). Until next time ♥


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We've finally reached the very short ending. Look for an update to "I Don't Want to Believe" before the next story in the series launches! Thanks for sticking with me through this prequel.

Life resumes relatively normally after that. Someone else handles the Gotham police, and the clean up, and whatever cover ups need to happen. Tim sends a set of roomba accessories to Roy (much to Kon's displeasure) and a set of books to Jason as a get well present. 

He stops by the hospital on the way out of town. He's not sure Jason is entirely aware with the amount of painkillers he's on, and grumpy about, but Tim feels like he's done more than his duty by seeing him. It makes his heart hurt more than it does beating out of rhythm, which he's been assured will correct itself eventually. 

Jason is charming and sweet, even so. It's only when Tim leans to give him a hug goodbye that the effects of his memory erasure are clear. “Gonna have to come visit me in bed when we don't have an audience. Promise you'll like it.” He says it with a smirk and a wink.

Tim can only offer him a half smile as they leave. Kon doesn't say anything, only watches him with sympathetic eyes that he's almost exhausted by. 

They both take a week off work when they return to D.C., but they talk a lot in the month that follows. Kon has a logical explanation for mostly everything and Tim gives up and lets him have it. Kon has his own personal demons to deal with after that confrontation and doesn't have to face up to the fact they saw a real one if he doesn't want to. Tim feels like he's grown up a little from the experience. 

He feels grown up enough to take at least a little control back and admit what he wants. Some things he wants are going to be forever out of his reach but others he's going to try his best to obtain. He sends a voucher for a plane ticket in his next letter to Stephanie. It's old fashioned. He hopes it gets the point across to her. He's tired of being alone and Kon can't shoulder all of his issues alone. 

Tim does paperwork which is something he normally has to be threatened to do. He's off field duty for whatever emotional damage he's sustained and Kon is off for even longer since the entire back side of him is bruised and grossly so. Further inspection has also revealed hairline cracks in his ribs, no doubt from not taking it easy in the aftermath. Tim feels a little bad for whining so much about the static electricity problem he has when he hears that because shocking himself on doorknobs is nothing compared to being in pain when you breathe. 

Things are almost back to being normal when a package arrives. And by package he means a brand new SUV, sitting in Kon's parking place instead of his bloody, scratched up Versa. A business card with the Wayne W monogrammed onto it is under the windshield wiper. 

“You needed it,” Tim points out. “That blood was never coming out of the back seat. We probably would have had to burn it.” 

“It still feels like he's buying me,” Kon replies. 

“You did kind of save his life and Jason's.” Tim is already thinking of all the stuff he can fit in this. They can go on road trips! “Plus after all the shit he put us through that could have been avoided with a little honesty, he owes us like six cars. Maybe a helicopter.” He could probably get a boat for fun but where would they store it?

In the passenger seat is a bag of coffee beans. They're imported, expensive, and accompanied by a note. Call me when you want to talk. Tim wants to say he'll want to talk to Bruce Wayne a quarter past never but that's not exactly fair, and he's sure he'll be curious again at some point when he's not so angry.

Three days after Jason completes his first stint of rehabilitation after surgery, he shows up at Tim's office. Tim is returning from a gym session with his partner, whining about how it hasn't helped his stress levels at all and there's this really interesting case involving a sewer when he sees the man, lounging casually in his office chair.

It's been a while since Tim's seen him. Of course he shows up right when he'd written him off. It was also right when he'd decided that Jason was good to text and nothing more should happen. “Hey,” Jason says like he isn't kind of pale and sweating. God knows what kind of shape he's in under his t-shirt if it's taken that much effort from him simply to walk into the office building. “Thought I might take you to lunch.” 

“How did you even get here?” Tim asks, while Kon stands gaping beside him. 

Jason shrugs. “I can drive, you know.” 

“No, really. How did you get in this office? This is a secure building.” Tim has to flash his ID and scan it a few times to even reach the little sub-basement office he and Kon call home. It's what makes it so frustrating when he loses his ID and why Kon's made him numerous lanyards to try to curb the problem. 

Kon snorts and starts to edge toward his desk and Jason snorts, stands up and pushes him back toward the door. “You're coming with us, farm boy. I want to hear all about your adventures.” 

Tim smirks. Maybe he's ready to tell Jason all about a few of them. He might not have all of Jason Wayne, and Jason Wayne might not have all of his memories, but it's something and that's better than nothing. Kon's coming with them. Stephanie's coming to Gotham. 

He's ready to not be alone any more.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments/Reviews/Requests always loved and appreciated. Drop them below or prompt me [here](http://strikeyourcolors.tumblr.com/ask)!


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